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Ceglia Sues For 50% Facebook, Old Emails as Evidence
Kamiza Ikioi writes "A lawsuit by Paul Ceglia contains never-before-seen emails from Mark Zuckerberg. The emails, if they prove to be real, could be the most damning evidence to date against Zuckerberg's business dealings in the time leading up to 'The Face Book' and just after. They paint a picture of a Zuckerberg more sinister than portrayed in the movie The Social Network, actively out to sucker his investors about the site, including Ceglia. FTA: 'Zuckerberg writes Ceglia an email telling him he's thinking of shutting down the Facebook site, because he's too busy to work on it and there's little interest in it among students. (This is while Facebook is growing like crazy). Ceglia gets really pissed off, and starts accusing Zuckerberg of pulling "criminal stunts."' Among the emails is one where Mark Zuckerberg agrees to split Facebook with Ceglia 50/50. If the emails are proven legitimate, Ceglia may own 50% of Facebook."
a consolation for us non-billionaires
They paint a picture of a Zuckerberg more sinister than portrayed in the movie The Social Network actively out to sucker his investors that the site, including Ceglia.
Either I'm having trouble with English, or the editors are...
To put any of his swindles into writing.
Still, we know how to fake an email header, right? What's going to prove these are genuine?
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Like!
I've not registered with facebook so I can't see much of it. Perhaps good.
In any event, I wish slashdot would go back to the old days of more tech stuff, with more about programming etc. The latest version of afterstep, new C compilers, and of course other stuff such as physics. But too much business crap just and stuff about drivel level science (e.g. global warming deniers, which anyone can show as being nutters with nearly zero time spent) takes much of the fun away.
Perhaps I'm misremembering, perhaps I'm getting different interests and don't want to select rubbish any more.
Being philosophical: I think that's actually what old people have: They are tired of hearing the same old crap again and again from people. They see through the BS and have had enough...
And all this business stuff is such BS, that will always remain, just like politicians are always bad, in just about all countries. These are given.
Or maybe a prequel that breaks cannon? Exciting! I hope it has a JarJar character in it!
1. Ceglia has e-mails that can be proven to be genuine. 2. Ceglia has e-mails that can neither be proven to be genuine nor to be forged. 3. Ceglia has e-mails that can be proved to be forged.
According to an article on www.businessinsider.com, "Paul and Iasia Ceglia are charged with 12 counts each of fourth-degree grand larceny and one count each of first-degree scheme to defraud" in what looks like a not very clever scam to get $200,000. That would destroy his credibility and therefore any chance to collect in case (2). And if the emails are forged, then I'd expect them to be provably forged, since Ceglia doesn't seem to be exactly a criminal mastermind.
if he's smart, he's already bought a few shares, so when he gets his 50%, he has complete control.
These emails and the overall correspondence is rather damning. This is very typical of early stage companies, where people throw around all sorts of numbers, and since everyone is essentially arguing over something that at the time is worthless, X% of nothing is no big deal and entrepreneurs basically promise all sorts of things to get people to help them out of desperation, not fully realizing what they are promising because they are so drunk on their idea.
However, once something becomes super valuable, everything changes. People go from arguing over 5 or 10 percent, to tenths of a percent. Still, the fact remains, that if (IFF) this guy's claims are valid, then it's a rather damning portrayal and one that should hold up in court. Outside of the actual proving of the evidence, which is pretty huge, it seems as if this is fairly legitimate. I find Facebook's response, "It's all made up BS, none of it is true", to be rather immature and short-sighted, because if they can show a significant degree of evidence, it will make Facebook and Zuckerberg look TRULY awful, whereas up until now, it has been sort of a cute story worth dramatizing in a movie.
I don't see how to wiggle out of this one, assuming the evidence is decent (cashed checks, signed contracts, etc.), and in fact, I would be terribly disappointed if Ceglia didn't end up with a huge chunk of Facebook. A deal's a deal, and this guy was in the right place at the right time, and if he did indeed provide a thousand bucks or perhaps more, and especially if they had a deal around that, well the guy absolutely 100% deserves his fair share.
Does this mean that my Goldman issued Facebook shares are only worth half as much as they were? If a swindler issues shares for a company run by a swindler, doesn't that make them legit? Where's the SEC when you need them?
"If the emails are proven legitimate..."
How does that actually work? What's involved in the process of proving the legitimacy of an email? What's the standard of evidence? Can any nerd here answer how the legitimacy of emails gets validated?
That's not how it would work. Assuming he gets 50% of the original company, Facebook has taken lots of private investment since then and that share would be watered down. He would bacially get half of what Zuckerberg's shares are worth, assuming he's kept them all. It all seems pretty fishy at this stage to me though.
According to an article on www.businessinsider.com, "Paul and Iasia Ceglia are charged with 12 counts each of fourth-degree grand larceny and one count each of first-degree scheme to defraud" in what looks like a not very clever scam to get $200,000. That would destroy his credibility and therefore any chance to collect in case (2).
No, character evidence is inadmissible, even in civil trials (unless defendant opens the door via testimony, i.e., "I'm a good person and would never fake e-mails.").
IAALBNYLSDNROTALA (I Am A Lawyer But Not Your Lawyer So Don't Rely On This As Legal Advice)
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
It proves there was an agreement. Verbal agreements are binding.
That brings me to an interesting point, / . is just "the ramblings of socially-inept, technology-literate news-mongers".
I suspect Mr. Ceglia is SOL. The key is in the examination of any written contract(s) between Mssrs. Ceglia and Zuckerberg. Per uslawbooks.com and forgery: "Proving it involves reviewing the totality of the law regarding the facts in evidence. This includes the signatures, a competent analysis of the signatures and an understanding of the law as it applies to the case." I'm sure there will be a lot of money spent on this.
Regarding the emails and IMs, unless Ceglia can dredge up the original electronic record archives from both his and Zuckerberg's contemporary mail servers, Ceglia's "emails" aren't worth squat. Looking back at Iran-Contra, what landed Reagan Administration officials in hot water was that the IBM Profs system email archives weren't purged, and provided a trail of authentication and non-repudiation for investigators. I have reason to doubt Mr. Ceglia is going to get a similar degree of audit-ability.
Luke, help me take this mask off
Arron Sorkin has a legitimate excuse to start writing the script for "Social Network 2: Payback Time" :)
Google him. He wrote the article, and, based on his past ethics, he's hardly above making this suit sound way stronger than it is. He has a history of market manipulation that the SEC did not find amusing.
Sent from the iPad I found in your car.
The Sarah Palin hacker did less than this, and he was sentenced to hard time:
...At one point, Mark appears to have exploited a flaw in ConnectU's account verification process to create a fake Cameron Winklevoss account with a fake Harvard.edu email address.
How Mark Zuckerberg Hacked Into Rival ConnectU In 2004
Mar. 5, 2010
http://www.businessinsider.com/how-mark-zuckerberg-hacked-connectu-2010-3
In this new, fake profile, he listed Cameron's height as 7'4", his hair color as "Ayran Blond," and his eye color as "Sky Blue." He listed Cameron's "language" as "WASP-y."
Next, Mark appears to have logged into the accounts of some ConnectU users and changed their privacy settings to invisible. The idea here was apparently to make it harder for people to find friends on ConnectU, thus reducing its utility. Eventually, Mark appears to have gone a step further, deactivating about 20 ConnectU accounts entirely...