This one's named after Robert Metcalfe , the inventor of the computer networking protocol Ethernet.

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And their decisions are, in most cases, straightforward: it is easy to tell whether one networking protocol or a piece of software works better than another.

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In the early days of his research, Cerf said, he worked on a more secure version of his networking protocol for the National Security Agency, but wasn't able to implement that technology in what would become the public Internet.

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Juniper Networks, which provides Internet Protocol networking products and services, mainly emphasizing telecom routing solutions, is another favorite short of DelVecchio.

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At the nexus of the consumer electronics-technology convergence sits Cisco, which makes many of the routers, switches, and other Internet protocol networking products that carry Internet content to the home.

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Bluetooth, a popular protocol for short-range networking, zips along at up to a megabit per second, but it bogs down when more than eight devices are linked up.

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While the device uses the same radio frequency band as the upcoming personal area networking technology Bluetooth, it uses a different transmission protocol.

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Take for example Internet Protocol (IP), which is the networking standard used to route electronic information packets around the world.

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According to research by Strategy Analytics, a market research company, over 90 percent of feature phone owners in the US and UK are interested in downloading and installing applications such as SNS (Social Networking Service), IM (Instant Messenger), VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol), and navigation and mapping.

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