The legal spat is winding down between Mark Zuckerberg and the former college classmates who accused him of stealing Facebook's business plan from them.
The two sides will be in U.S. District Court in San Jose, Calif., on Wednesday to iron out the details of a settlement between Facebook and ConnectU, founded by Cameron Winklevoss, Tyler Winklevoss, and Divya Narendra.
The three ConnectU founders claimed in a lawsuit filed in 2004 that Zuckerberg, Facebook's founder, stole ConnectU's code and business plan while all four were students at Harvard University.
ConnectU tried to back out of the settlement after a computer-forensics expert it hired discovered some of Zuckerberg's instant-messaging logs that the company claims is relevant to the case.
Once it obtained the logs, ConnectU accused Facebook of fraud and asked the judge to throw out the settlement. One of the reasons ConnectU gave was that Facebook never disclosed that it had altered the value of its common stock not long before February's settlement was reached.
Facebook, which is not publicly traded, did not deny that it had altered its valuation, and the judge in the case found nothing in Facebook's actions to be fraudulent.
As for what was revealed in Zuckerberg's IM logs, we don't know because the court has prevented the public from gaining access to much of the information in the case.
Indeed, the only fireworks left in the dispute might come from a third party: CNET Networks, parent company of News.com. CNET objected to U.S. District Judge James Ware's decision to close the courtroom for a June 23 hearing between Facebook and ConnectU and is pursuing a request to have the court unseal documents related to the proceedings. (CNET Networks has since been acquired by CBS in a deal that closed Monday.)
The reason for barring the public appears clear. Facebook doesn't want to reveal financial information, the content of Zuckerberg's IM logs, and the terms of the settlement. case. As my colleague Declan McCullagh wrote in a recent blog, the term "under seal" appears at least 234 times in the official court docket.
McCullagh wrote: "Not only should the courtroom not have been closed, but any audio recording or transcript of the proceedings should be released."
SNL meets Mark Zuckerberg.
In a surprise move that has shocked Silicon Valley, young Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg will guest host an upcoming episode of Saturday Night Live, according to multiple sources.
The mild-mannered Zuckerberg, best-known for vanilla-flavored speeches filled with talking points about "the social graph" and "making communication more efficient," will provide the opening monologue as well as appear in a number of sketches on the NBC show's April 5 episode.
Appearing on the sketch comedy show is something Zuckerberg has wanted to do for a long time, a close friend confided to CNET News.com. "Mark actually has really good comic timing," the friend said on condition of anonymity, out of the fear that Zuckerberg might "de-friend" him on Facebook if his identity were revealed. "He's got this totally hilarious side that nobody ever gets to see, except his stuffed animals and sometimes his investors. Ever since Justin Timberlake did that sweet music video on the show, he's been aching to go on SNL. He had his assistant call up NBC but they were all like, 'Mark who?'"
The friend continued, "Now that he's been on 60 Minutes and that Forbes billionaire list and everybody's heard of him, SNL has finally agreed to let him come on the show. When he got the call he was so happy he poked everybody on his Facebook friends list." Zuckerberg was reportedly even more excited that the musical guest for the April 5 show will be his favorite "emo" band, Panic at the Disco.
Shouldn't Zuckerberg be in the green room already?
(Credit: Facebook)The famously shy and awkward Zuckerberg has been warming up to the press recently, but this is still an unexpected move. Wall Street analysts, when asked whether they thought this would help or hurt Facebook's potential valuation as it reportedly heads toward an initial public offering, were left more or less speechless. "I guess it couldn't hurt, unless he really f***s it up," one Deutsche Bank analyst commented.
Sources close to NBC have confirmed that the 23-year-old CEO will be acting in a parody of his disastrous South by Southwest interview with BusinessWeek columnist Sarah Lacy. "This time, people are going to be throwing stuff at them," one source said. "Apparently they're going to have a lightsaber fight, too."
Lacy will be portrayed by SNL regular Andy Samberg.
Zuckerberg will also play "a crazed Barack Obama supporter" in another sketch, according to script details leaked to News.com. His role in a third sketch is less clear, but the costume department has reportedly been asked to create a "pink polka-dotted fur suit" that fits Zuckerberg's compact frame.
Reports that Zuckerberg would also be sporting drag and portraying John McCain's wife could not be confirmed at the time of publication. "But he's definitely going to be playing a girl in something," a Facebook colleague hinted. "He's been working on his falsetto in board meetings."
Editor's note: Remember, today is April 1, a day reserved in the U.S. for some levity.
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg talks to BusinessWeek's Sarah Lacy at SXSW.
(Credit: Caroline McCarthy/CNET News.com)Chelsea Holden Baker, of frog design, says better planning and a different design choice could have changed the outcome during the now-infamous 2008 SXSW keynote discussion between Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and reporter Sarah Lacy.
Here is Chelsea's blog on the matter from Tuesday:
If you have any interest in South by Southwest and/or the blogosphere, then you've probably seen something on the infamous train-wreck-of-an-interview, aka the SXSW keynote discussion with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and journalist Sarah Lacy. (In this metaphor Zuckerberg is the Little Engine That Could and Lacy is the conductor that derailed the train). Forty-five minutes into it, the crowd wrestled control of the mikes, cutting short Lacy's interview to ask their own questions.
Recaps can be found elsewhere, but there are two interesting things to think about in the aftermath of this mob-jacking. One is how Twittering can amplify a crowd's reaction, and how it could make future keynotes better. The other is how bad design can change the outcome on a stage.
What was amazing, from the point of view of someone in the room, and someone who was following the live chat on Meebo, was that if Lacy had had a laptop she could have seen the crowd revolt coming. Or rather, she could have changed her questions, style, even body language (so many comments about hair twirling!) so that it wouldn't have happened.
Yes, there is much speculation about Facebook's PR interest in an event like this, and yes, Zuckerman has a reputation for tight lips and short answers. But this is a scenario where an old-school back-and-forth is a dated approach. In the end it didn't serve anyone--Zuckerberg (he came off "nice," but not exciting), Lacy, or the audience. The audience had a parallel conversation online, which at least with the Meebo strain, is archived in perpetuity. A lot of it was snarky, but the sentiments, and some of the questions raised there, were important.
Twittering (on Twitter and elsewhere) pushed people to act out; it accelerated interruption. People who did not like the way the interview was going had assurance that the crowd was with them; and it intensified those feelings. In traditional passive audience situations, for every person who acts out, the ratio of those who wanted to but didn't, is probably much higher. Instead, because people knew that not only the people sitting next to them, but also those in all four corners of the room had the same gripes--or pointed out new ones--many people acted out. As Lacy said, what we got was "Digg-style mob-rule." Essentially: Twittering lowers the threshold for lash-out. Of course, the positive spin on this is that at next year's SXSW, people on panels could (should) get to see feedback and respond accordingly.
Secondly, early on in the Meebo chat, there were comments about Lacy's posture and body language. To this I say: Don't blame Lacy, blame bad design. Zuckerberg and Lacy both had club chairs. You have two options with that kind of seat: Zuckerberg chose to perch on the edge, sitting very upright, looking a bit eager and uptight. Lacy chose the traditional club chair posture: Lean back, cross your legs, and keep one arm up as if you're smoking a cigarette in the wood-paneled library at the Fair Oaks Golf Course.
One user in the Meebo chat, dango3kyoudai, said: "Watching her sit sprawled back in her chair just turns me off in some way; a metaphor for journalistic sloth." While I'm not sure what the best interview chair is, this certainly isn't it. Lacy's posture was the first turn-off. Unfortunately, much of what came from her mouth amplified an initial bad reaction to what was perceived as flirtatious (however unfair that is), overly-casual/intimate nonverbal signals.
A nice Bertoia-style stool would be great: There's only one way to sit in them. And yes, it may be uncomfortable for an hour, but so was what we witnessed. There's no reason why Lacy shouldn't have had a clue the audience wasn't with her until 40 minutes into the discussion.
Lessons for next year's keynotes: Provide a peek at what's happening on Meebo/Twitter (edited by a third party, and read on handheld device), and high chairs for the pair of presenters.
Clips of audience responding to the stage:
Kara Swisher has a deliciously speculative piece up Friday about who Mark Zuckerberg should appoint to replace Owen Van Natta as Facebook's No. 2.
Before weighing in, though, I must say that Zuckerberg just made his first business mistake--nothing that he won't recover from, but an error nonetheless. He should have pulled an Andreessen. Instead, he's trying to pull a Gates.
Marc Andreessen was the technological brains behind Netscape. His company thrived--until it was brought down by Microsoft's death ray--because the role of Netscape CEO was entrusted to an experienced business executive named Jim Barksdale.
You didn't find that same division of labor at Microsoft until years after it evolved into a multibillion-dollar monopolist. Gates was that rare bird who, like Steve Jobs at Apple, displayed acumen both in business and technology. But you'd be hard-pressed to point to many prodigies in the technology business endowed with similar skills.
That's why Zuckerberg's only fooling himself. When he takes a hard look in the mirror, is that really the second coming of Bill Gates staring back? I don't think so. He had a ready CEO candidate waiting in the wings in the person of Van Natta. Zuckerberg could have done a lot worse--for instance, by retaining the top spot for himself.
Full disclosure: I've known Van Natta since the 1990s, when he was a sales intern at Computer Shopper in New York, when I worked as an editor for that publication. After Computer Shopper, Van Natta's business career led to Elon Musk, then heading a start-up called Zip2. (Compaq later brought out Zip2 for $300 million.) After a couple of pit stops, he wound up doing business development for Jeff Bezos at Amazon.com. And when the entrepreneurial bug again bit, he landed at Facebook during the early days.
Van Natta, who was appointed chief operating officer, helped hammer out the Microsoft deal and oversaw Facebook's spectacular growth. Last year, his title got changed into something called chief revenue officer and vice president of operations, kindling speculation that it was only a matter of time before his next gig. Swisher, who has been doing the best reporting in the Valley on Facebook, broke the news about Van Natta's departure earlier this week.
Dan Rosensweig: Would he Facebook?
Now back to Kara's picks. I like one of her choices--but for the CEO job. Dan Rosensweig, who used to run ZDNet and was No. 2 here at CNET Networks before moving over to Yahoo to become chief operating officer, would be a master stroke. Rosensweig is supersmart and a charismatic sort of manager. He's connected both on Wall Street and Silicon Valley. (Another disclosure: I've known Rosensweig since 1989, so I'm already coming at this with an ingrained bias.) But right now, Rosensweig's enjoying "hanging with the family"--at least to play second fiddle. If Facebook really wants him, Zuckerberg would need to compromise.
Another possible candidate--again an old-school connection for me--is Shelby Bonnie. He's a CNET co-founder and was its CEO for much of its history. Here's another savvy tech executive with time on his hands these days. Like Rosensweig, Bonnie's one of the good guys. And during the dot-com bust, he steered the company away from its near-death experience when the stock traded under a buck. And if anyone has learned from mistakes how to scale an online-media company, Bonnie is as experienced as any candidate out there.
But all of this is moot speculation. At least for the time being, Zuckerberg believes that he's worth every bit the $15 billion Facebook is said to be valued. And unless there's a sudden change, there's no room in his future for someone else to play Numero Uno at his company.
SAN FRANCISCO--If you listened carefully, Wall Street issued a collective groan late today. That's when Facebook's CEO very publicly doused speculation about an imminent initial public offering.
"I'm not saying it's never going to happen," said Mark Zuckerberg. "But it's definitely years out."
Zuckerberg made his comments while speaking with John Battelle to lead off the Web 2.0. Summit which got underway here today.
What with all the hype and frenzy surrounding Facebook, Zuckerberg not surprisingly attracted a spillover audience crowding into the main ballroom of this city's Palace Hotel, an elegant throwback which opened its doors in 1875 (which wasn't all that long after the California Gold Rush ended.)
As co-host of the three-day event, Battelle tried--with some success--to draw Zuckerberg out of his shell during the course of an hour question-and-answer session. But when it came to getting Facebook's founder to comment on the rumors about either a forthcoming sale or IPO, Battelle took a called strike three.
"Well, you have years before that event," Zuckerberg said.
Developers, developers, developers! The crowd at the NYC Facebook meetup.
(Credit: Caroline McCarthy/CNET Networks)Developers interested in working with Facebook Platform, the new third-party widget initiative from the fast-growing social networking site, gathered in several locations on Wednesday evening to hold inaugural Developer Meetups. The New York get-together, hosted by local entrepreneur Amit Gupta, was attended by somewhere between 80 and 90 people--mostly either developers who wanted to learn how they can use Facebook's offerings, or start-up entrepreneurs who had caught the "every Web 2.0 company needs a Facebook Platform app" bug.
Attendees knew that the event would feature a videoconference with Facebook's director of platform, Dave Morin, who was calling in from the San Francisco meetup. What they didn't know is that Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg happened to be in New York for a family commitment and decided to drop by. The 23-year-old CEO was promptly bombarded with questions from the developers and enthusiasts in attendance, the majority of whom seemed to be of the opinion that Facebook Platform is a pretty big deal for the Web. (There were a few naysayers, all of whom took the perspective that small, limited applications embedded in Facebook profiles ultimately aren't that useful. Most of the other attendees were quick to point out exceptions.)
Speaking to the audience, Zuckerberg said that his company knew it was running the risk of ticking off its user base by opening the doors to developers. "That was obviously a really big risk," he said. "One thing that we've spent a lot of time on is just keeping the site clean"--it's famous, after all, for its simple blue-and-white interface.
"At the end of the day it comes down to efficiency for us," Zuckerberg added. "I just think that in the long run, there will be a set of really good applications" contributed to the site by outside developers, which will ultimately add to the user experience rather than detract from its efficiency. "It's slightly discontinuous, but I think it's probably worth it to get the diversity of applications."
And from the reactions in the crowd, as well as the statistics (a third of Facebook members have already installed Facebook Platform applications), it looks like people are willing to accept that discontinuity. One audience member pointed out that at Facebook's current growth rate--50 million projected by the end of 2007, and 100 million projected somewhere in mid-2008--it's approaching the population of a sizeable country, or at least, potentially, the face of "Web 3.0." After hesitating momentarily and looking rather surprised, Zuckerberg answered, "We've tried to create a new platform. I don't know if it's Web 3 or anything like that."
The last question came from an audience member who wanted to know when "version 2" of Facebook Platform would come out. Zuckerberg hinted that it might not be unveiled through a high-profile announcement like the original developer platform's launch several weeks ago.
"It'll be rolling," he said.
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