After Zuckerberg’s laywer admitted Mark done work for Paul Ceglia, Zuckerberg himself addressed the million dollar question (literally)! Who owns Facebook? Does Zuckerberg owe 84 per cent of Facebook to a New York firewood salesman?
His comments in a TV interview followed an American federal court hearing on Tuesday, in which a Facebook lawyer said she was “unsure” whether Zuckerberg had signed a contract in 2003. Funny enough it’s this contract which Paul Ceglia claims entitles him to a majority large share of the world’s most dominant social network.
“If we said that we were unsure I think that was likely taken out of context, because I think we are quite sure that we did not sign a contract that says that they have any right to ownership over Facebook,” Zuckerberg informed ABC News.
Of course, when he says “we”, he really means “I”. The dispute stems from when a student Zuckerberg was independently touting his services as a coder for hire.
Note that the 26-year-old CEO isn’t saying he didn’t sign any contract with Ceglia. We already know he did! His lawyers said he did! He is however “quite sure” that what he did sign doesn’t grant equity in Facebook. Ceglia’s lawyers say different, and that he invested $1,000 in what became Facebook, after employing Zuckerberg to work on a separate project.
I reckon this will be an interesting one…technically it seems like Zuckerberg code stole from a different project. Although he wrote the code if he was “hired’ he is unlikely to own it. It depends really that what of that code is used today and was ever used.
A court could make Zuckerberg pay royalties for using code copyrighted to Ceglia. Alternatively they could rule either way!
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