Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Will Mark Zuckerberg Have to Give Up 50% of Facebook?

Paul Ceglia, a wood pellet manufacturer, says he owns half of Facebook.

Ceglia, who originally filed a lawsuit last summer, now has high powered attorneys who believe in the authenticity of the contract Ceglia has and the emails he claims are exchanges that took place between Zuckerberg and himself.

Either, Ceglia is totally out of his mind and forged these documents or Zuckerberg may have a new partner.

Henry Blodget has put together a blow-by-blow of this fascinating tale, here.

3 comments:

  1. If the original emails were sent to and stored on a web-based email user agent like Hotmail, the electronic track might be pretty solid even if Zuckerberg deleted them on his end.

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  2. If he decides to really pursue this it could get really messy, Zuckerberg no longer owns 50% of facebook, not even close. They would have to dilute all the current owners to give him his share, all those big players who invested hundreds of millions and even billions of dollars suddenly having their investment cut in half... Of course if his case holds water they will try and settle, so it's all a matter of how far he will want to take it.

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  3. Wow. This is going to be distracting for Facebook's employees, who I suspect are generally young and immature. And if Ceglia's case holds water, there's going to be a flurry of lawsuits against Zuckerberg by the other owners.

    From Business Insider:

    "The emails then include Zuckerberg telling Ceglia that the Facebook site is not doing well. They include Zuckerberg telling Ceglia that the site has seen so little success that Zuckerberg is thinking of shutting it down. And, in the summer of 2004, they include Zuckerberg offering to send Ceglia his $2,000 of funding back--right at the time Zuckerberg had moved to California to continue to develop, incorporate, and raise money for Facebook."

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