Facebook and its Ongoing Pursuit Of Closure
As Mark Zuckerberg, played by Oscar-nominated actor Jesse Eisenberg, famously suggested to Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss in 2010’s “The Social Network”, “if you guys were the inventors of Facebook, you’d have invented Facebook.”
Although the real life story of Zuckerberg’s day to day operation of Facebook may be far more mundane than the movie depicting it, the cutthroat nature of the characters involved certainly aren’t.
Ever since its conception in 2004 and its subsequent viral spread worldwide, Facebook has been plagued by a perpetual struggle of individuals attempting to claim ownership over the multi-billion dollar company. Many individuals have been scratching and clawing at Facebook through the legal system for years, including former founder Eduardo Savarin, the Winklevoss twins, and now business owner Paul Ceglia.
For Zuckerberg, the ongoing court battles and constant efforts to ruin his reputation were most likely not what the Harvard drop-out had in mind when he initially began development on what would become one of the biggest internet companies in the world.
Lawsuits haven’t been uncommon for Zuckerberg. The Winklevoss twins first filed suit against Facebook in 2007, winning an estimated $65 million in the case. But soon after, they sought to reopen their case claiming that they were cheated out of a significant amount of money, suggesting that they deserved significantly greater compensation.
Now 4 years later, with the Winklevoss twins having finally decided to no longer pursue their case against Facebook, it appears that Zuckerberg is finally one step closer towards peace.
Still, a future that isn’t shrouded with lawsuits for Facebook currently looks Utopian at best. Recently, a business owner named Paul Ceglia filed a lawsuit against Facebook claiming that he deserves up to an 84% stake in the company, citing e-mail correspondences between him and Zuckerberg in 2003. And, while his claims may be tenuous at best, it still suggests that Facebook isn’t even close to being out of the water yet.
While I can’t exactly speak for Zuckerberg himself, Facebook’s ongoing struggle to truly escape the confines of the legal system must undoubtedly be causing a lot of frustration for Zuckerberg.
If anything, it’s just proved that although Zuckerberg may have founded Facebook, even he can’t make friends with everyone.
Source: MSM DesignZ, Inc. is a Westchester NY Social Media company specializing in advertising, web and graphic design, and SEO.