Facebook faces off
p2pnet news | product news:- Did Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg steal the idea for the site from three Harvard University students?
US district court judge Douglas P. Woodlock will be pondering the question in a hearing in Boston today.
Zuckerberg wants him to dismiss a case brought by Harvard University students Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss and Divya Narenda who, says InformationWeek, claim Zuckerberg, “agreed to develop their Web site idea in 2003, worked on it for a while, disappeared, then promised a ‘functioning’ Web site around the time he registered Facebook.com”.
The three want control of the site and an order awarding them profits from it, says the story.
Rupert Murdoch’s daughter
Over in the UK, membership includes millions of British such as David Miliband, Orlando Bloom and Tracey Emin, as well as senior members of the media such as Jonathan Dimbleby, Andrew Neil, Spectator editor Matthew d’Ancona and even MySpace owner Rupert Murdoch’s daughter Elisabeth, says The Observer, continuing:
“MySpace was bought by News Corporation in 2005 for $580m, now regarded as a bargain. Facebook is expected to sell for more than double that, turning Zuckerberg, its 23-year-old creator, into the latest dotcom millionaire and darling of Silicon Valley.”
Facebook “sped away” while ConnectU, owned by Winklevoss and Narenda, “was still in the traps,” says the story which has Tyler Winklevoss saying:
“You feel robbed. The kids down the hall are using it, and you’re thinking, ‘That’s supposed to be us.’ We’re not there because one greedy kid cut us out.”
Legal technicality
A judge threw out an earlier case brought by ConnectU because of a legal technicality, says InformationWeek. Facebook, “also filed its own countersuit claiming that ConnectU is abusing the legal process.”
Is this a complaint lodged recently with news that the sale of Facebook is likely to make Zuckerberg and his colleagues very rich indeed?
After developing the idea for ConnectU, then HarvardConnection, “founders Divya Narendra, Cameron Winklevoss and Tyler Winklevoss hired Zuckerberg to work as a programmer for their site, according to a complaint filed Sept. 2, 2004, in Massachusetts District Court,” says the Brown Daily Herald, going on:
Oral contract
The ConnectU creators claim that they had an oral contract with Zuckerberg, who signed on to the project in late 2003 but was not paid. By early 2004, Zuckerberg was purportedly neglecting his responsibilities as programmer, thus delaying ConnectU’s launch. Then, in February 2004, he launched Thefacebook.com. ConnectU was launched in May.”
The trio took their complaint to Harvard’s Administrative Board in spring 2004, “but were told that it was beyond the body’s jurisdiction,” says the story, adding, “Zuckerberg and Thefacebook team filed a counterclaim on Nov. 18, contending that ConnectU is abusing the legal system for its own ends”.
Stay tuned.
Also See:
InformationWeek – Facebook, Accused Of Copying Idea, Gets Hearing, July 23, 2007
The Observer – Faceoff!, July 22, 2007
Brown Daily Herald – Discovery phase in lawsuit begins this month, but trial uncertain, July 3, 2007
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