Slashdot Mirror
Man Claiming Half of Facebook Suffers Setbacks
itwbennett writes "Slashdot readers will remember Paul Ceglia, the man who says Mark Zuckerberg agreed to split Facebook with him and has the email to prove it. Well, his case took a turn for the worse this week. Two law firms representing him resigned, the judge refused to postpone a hearing to allow his new lawyers to get caught up, and the judge ordered him to turn over computers and electronic and paper evidence."
when you threaten to close down the Judge's Facebook account.
I take it that Mr Ceglia didn't "like" this update.
Enough is enough! Stop with the news about Facebook!
Only half of Facebook suffers setbacks?
yeah, that's probably what happened...
I don't care about any of this Facebook crap, but I'm pretty sure it's "catch up" and not "get caught up".
Zuckerberg may be a twit but he did code. Paul Ceglia is a pure bullshit artist.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
>ultra-liberals,
How the *fuck* does political proclivity come into play here?
Explain, in detail.
--
BMO
Referring to the anti-corporation, anti-government posts on /., which is what the responses have been thus far in this thread in regards to Facebook.
Liberals are anti-government? That's news to me.
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
Whatever the real score is, either of them should present evidences that will prove which party is saying the truth.In Paul Ceglia side, if he has all the evidences, then there's no second thought of showing it as what the judges had ask him to do.
how to delete file
That would be news to them, too. Maybe OP meant ultra-libertarians? Or maybe they just blame liberals for everything? I know someone like that (emphasis on everything), which is sad because otherwise he's reasonably intelligent.
In my opinion, emails can be legally binding, if it is an established communication channel, or if both parties act in accordance with the agreement described in the emails.
If you really want to have it your way, what do you think about EULAs being binding?
Hey don't blame me, IANAB
what do you think about EULAs being binding?
They should not be. How do you prove that a particular person was the person who clicked on "I Agree?" It is not like you have a copy of a contract, with the person's signature on it.
Palm trees and 8
>Last I checked, emails weren't legally binding, as a contract is
Check again.
Congress passed the ESIGN act to prevent people from repudiating contracts that were made electronically. That was the foundation of the e-commerce boom (otherwise, how would you expect companies to sell on the Internet when people could just say "Oh, that wasn't a real contract, it was just electronic.")
Btw, a contract doesn't need to even be written to be a contract. The written form helps in establishing what was contracted, though.
A contract requires an offer, an acceptance, and consideration (exchange of value).
If you hash out terms for a business deal over email, and at the end you accept it, you just made a contract.
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
Yeah, it reminds me too much of the years I spent reading and laughing at Conservapedia. It's worrying when terms like "liberal" and "conservative" are bandied around in a way that'd sound very familiar if those words were replaced with nigger or jew.
The core issue is that extreme conservatives and liberals are most often very fond indeed of government - so long as it's their guy in office. They'll only get antsy when the other side gets in - as we saw with Clinton, Bush Jr. and now Obama. This partisan bullshit is one of the many things screwing up America.
Then of course we have the unaffiliated nutjobs who won't let party lines get in the way of stockpiling ammunition and conspiracy theories.
This. I meant for my statement to include Libertarians and intended for it to be implied as such, but perhaps I should have been more specific, as people look for any excuse to attack minutiae rather than the core argument that was originally proposed
If we listened to those people complaining loudest and hardest, banned all Facebook, Twitter, iterative product releases, generic rants and blogs, flamebait and troll articles, and reviews, what would be left? One story per day, which half the people on Slashdot didn't even understand, because it was too technical?
Basically, you just pointed out to me that Slashdot is a waste of time - at most, all one needs is the RSS feed for the headlines and if you see something interesting, google it yourself. Such as new releases of important things: books, software, security updates, .... that's about it.
Neither liberals nor conservatives are anti-government. The difference lies in what each wishes the govenment to do. Conservatives wish the government to enforce private morality and to create and defend property rights. (No government, no property beyond immediate use and occupation.) Liberals wish the government to defend and care for the poor and disadvantaged.
...in a right associative sense: (Man Claiming (Half of Facebook Suffers Setbacks))
what do you think about EULAs being binding?
They should not be. How do you prove that a particular person was the person who clicked on "I Agree?" It is not like you have a copy of a contract, with the person's signature on it.
They can't be, because it's not in exchange for anything -- you've already bought the product, you own it free and clear, so violation of the EULA would not be theft of anything.
Wonder what the public key field is for?
-there was a payoff somewhere to someone.. 'Would you rather work for him? O-o-or, would you rather ~not work for him?' Before anyone gets to thinking of ethical, notable and chivalrous action by lawyers, remember they do follow the money. 'Is there `something I'm holding in my left hand that might look better in the right hand(s)?'
>:-D
This reminds me of the fake will awarding Melvin Dummar about half of the Howard Hughes estate for allegedly picking up a hitch hiking Mr. Hughes in the desert some time in the '60s. Like the Face Book email, this didn't go anywhere.
These events are typical. Although it is rough for the new lawyers to lack time to prepare, it is not uncommon for judges to refuse to give more time by delaying hearings. Judges have a lot of cases and need to keep all of them moving along.
As for turning over original documents, that is merely part of the discovery process in U.S. litigation. In fact, it would be exceptionally sloppy, indeed, perhaps even malpractice, for the defendants to fail to insist on the production of the originals whenever authenticity of a document (paper or electronic) is at issue.
The resignations of his law firms may be true setbacks, but there are lots of reasons why that could have happened. We'll probably never know why because of client confidentiality and privilege rules.
Laws affecting technology will always be bad until enough techies become lawyers.
If the money hungry lawyers won't represent him why were they representing him in the first place why bail out right before the hearing? Why won't the judge delay the hearing so the new lawyers can get up to speed? Judges delay things all the time even on the biggest bull shit cases. And emails are admissible in court an email is basically a written form of a conversation. How about emailing or faxing a contract I do it all the time.
For example many years ago I walked out of a bar rubbed my eye and my contact fell out. Then I walked right into a cop rounding the corner of the building because I couldn't see. Cops hassled me and then told me to be on my way. I was walking to my tuck to get my glasses and was jumped by two cops hit in the stomach and face several times forced into the cop car without being arrested in from of several witnesses. The next day I was charged with a bunch of bullshit. Point is the prosecutor delayed the trial 6 times in his hunt for evidence against me finally my lawyer made a motion that the prosecutor was intentionally delayed the trial because there was no evidence and the judge set a finale trial date. On the day of the trial the prosecutor approached my lawyer and tried to make a deal 'you give me this trial and I'll give you one latter on' my lawyer said no I had been assaulted, unlawfully confined and had false charges filed . At that point to prosecutor decided to drop the charges and I didn't have to even go in the court house. Mind you I had to live under very strict bail condition for 8 months it cost me thousands in lawyers and I couldn't even charge the cops with assault because there is a three month statute of limitations for police in my area and I couldn't press charges until after my day in court which took 8 months. The cops even threatened me after court and the matter had to be brought up to their supervisor.
Being legally binding is a separate issue from the burden of proof. A written contract is legally binding, but if you can't prove who wrote the signature on it, it's not enforceable. Conversely, you may not be able to prove who clicked on the "I accept" button, but it's still legally binding in theory (so if, for example, someone testifies they saw you click it, the contract is enforceable).
So, suddenly TWO law firms representing some person, resigns. ok. even if it is a stretch, it can still be explained and justified.
but, there is nothing to justify the judge postponing the hearing in this situation. with this, basically that citizen's right to defend his case is effectively being denied. the only situation in which he could be expected to defend his case would be that he was a lawyer himself or had legal training. and since he hired legal help as per law because he wasnt, he cannot be reasonably expected to defend his case.
the judge in this case should be prosecuted. there is no excuse for this.
Read radical news here
Zuckster the bastard Huckster and his team got to the other teams and paid them off. Happens all the time.
Oh, but you can't just "buy" judges in America. You have to make a donation to SOB's favorite charity: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/23/education/23newark.html
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Are you for real?
If the money hungry lawyers won't represent him why were they representing him in the first place why bail out right before the hearing?
This morning I was planning on taking a bike ride but then it started to rain so I didn't. Things change.
As for why the prosecutor was able to get the judge to delay trial in your case, you do realize that even though the judge, DA and cops are supposed to serve the people, they're mostly on the same side, not your side.
The summary and the blog seem to be biased towards Facebook but the actual AP and NYT report don't make it seem like such a landslide for them.
Even a verbal agreement is BINDING it's just difficult to prove it existed. I would say if you had an agreement in writing (as an email) that was authentic then that would be binding. So check again.
....so now facebook is big enough to buy judges. And the reign of the corporate overlords continues. *yawn*
As much as I dislike Zuckerberg, in this case it sounds like this guy is a total scam artist. Facebook hired a linguistics expert to compare the E-mails Ceglia claims prove his case against known E-mails written by Zuckerberg during the same time period. The results are not encouraging for Ceglia, and are quite convincing. There's some significant differences in writing style, and there's well established research that writing styles are mostly fixed, people write the same way routinely unless deliberately trying to do otherwise. You'd have to believe that Zuckerberg deliberately wrote differently in the Ceglia E-mails, something which is very hard to buy into. After that his lawyers resigned on him, a very, very bad sign for him. Sounds like the judge concurs, he's not buying it either.
i would claim this too
Man claiming *ownership of* half of Facebook *has* suffered *a* setback....
Anyone else not get that the first time you read the headline?
Regardless of the honest status of his claim, he is not going to get anything but a lawyer bill. Why is this so obvious or should be? Simply look around at whats been going on in the cyber world of leaks and the ramping up of taxpayer funded cyber security and social network infiltration forces. i.e. http://www.seankerrigan.com/docs/PersonaManagementSoftware.pdf or do a search on "us gov fake people" and wonder how many are here on Slashdot? But the point is why would this guy be allowed to challenge facebook when he clearly would be an exposure threat to any involvement FB has in such manipulations. Manipulations for which people are getting tired of https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=231576206868906&id=123257617694097
And for what its worth, if anything at all, Facebook had representation at Bilderberg group this year. Certainly Facebook is not a company to be both invited to such a gathering and also be threatened by what would be considered a punk to those of such a group. Perhaps his lawyers came to realize this.
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"Man claiming half of facebook suffers setbacks".
I read that as "there is a man who is claiming that half if Facebook is suffering settbacks".
How about "man claims half of facebook, suffers setbacks"?
But if you actually did click on it, and then testify that you didn't, then you're lying under oath and it's considered perjury.
Facebook's at a $80,000,000,000 valuation. If half of Facebook is suffering setbacks then Google and Apple are in deep shit.
With the MySpace-like down-trending that Facebook is going through, Mr. Ceglia might end up being awarded nothing if he wins outside of worthless stock.
"Good, Fast, Cheap: Pick any two" -- RFC 1925
I'm actually replying to your "signature" line advertisement for Dreamhost. Their claim of 180GB storage and 1.8TB of monthly traffic is complete and total BS. I opened an account with them once when I actually had over 100GB of video data (legitimately my own files, not copyrighted or pirated stuff) to upload. Within a few hours of my beginning to upload all this data I began to receive "urgent" emails from Dreamhost telling me to cease and desist uploading files because I had exceeded both my allocated storage space and my traffic limit. When I did not comply (because after all, their claim to provide all that storage was the only reason I had opened an account with them in the first place), they deleted my account and refused to refund my first years payment. They're all crooks at Dreamhost.com as far as I am concerned.
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but, there is nothing to justify the judge [not] postponing the hearing in this situation.
I'm going to guess by the bit about prosecuting the judge for his decision that you meant to say the "not" I included above.
If so, then you're probably just not familiar with the discovery process in US courts. Generally speaking, the discovery process (in which parties to a case are required to turn over certain evidence to the other side to avoid "trial by ambush") is handled entirely between both parties' attorneys with the court getting involved. This is because discovery is a time-consuming process and courts are generally too busy to get involved in every little lawyers' tiff. So, for a court to get involved must mean that one side (i.e. Ceglia's) has been behaving very badly by refusing to do discovery requests. In cases where people refuse to produce documents required for the other side to defend their case, courts are usually harsh once they wade in.
Worse, the fact that his own law firms have resigned at such a time probably means one of three things: (a) firm malpractice for which the client will suffer at first before bringing a later malpractice suit, (b) client misbehavior that risks professional sanctions for his lawyers if they don't drop him like a radioactive hot potato, (c) stalling tactics by the client to beg for more time. Either way, Celiga's case isn't looking too good if he's lost his attorneys and has a judge on top of him for refusing discovery of evidence central to his entire case.
I claim that all of facebook is suffering from setbacks.
Well you're a douche for not stopping your uploads and asking them exactly what they meant, and how you were exceeding your storage space and traffic limit. If you don't answer their e-mails what do you expect to happen you moron?
It's conceivable that he just can't get along with his lawyers, but the odds are that the simultaneous resignations of two law firms mean that they have discovered that there is something seriously wrong with the case. Most likely that means that they now think the documents he has produced are forgeries. If they know that, they can't continue as they would be suborning fraud and perjury.
Myspace still was values 35 million. If you would give me half of that value in stocks i still would not complain.
The whole point probably was to get a quick settlement from facebook, a sort of, why would facebook risk 50% of 250 Billion if they could settle for some millions. Even if the odds of winning for paul ceglia were only 1% the settlement still could be a good deal.
Paul Ceglia: The Man Who Owns 84% of Facebook? link
"Ceglia sifting through old files in his western New York home to find assets to pay back his clientele. He says he came across a document signed in 2003 by Mark Zuckerberg, then a freshman at Harvard and now chief executive of Facebook. He says the document is a valid contract that entitles him to an 84 percent stake in Facebook"
"Mr. Ceglia's high-profile representation .. recently withdrew from the case at a critical juncture .. Mr. Ceglia is carrying on with a small, boutique-y firm of four San Diego-based attorneys who, according to CNET, represent 200 medical marijuana collectives. link
Better watch out then as if you win then these two will come suing your ass off Winklevoss Twins Resume Facebook Attack..
I thought a man was claiming that half of FB is suffering setbacks. (Half of features, half of users, what???)
A suggested restructuring using the same words: "Setbacks Suffered by Man Claiming Half of Facebook". Even better to begin that one with "Legal".
I'd be willing to bet money, (and it sounds like they were too) that there was a clause in there covering their asses. Most likely a shitty daily limit to make that 1.8tb monthly nigh impossible to attain without watching the clock. Either way, you're a douche for ignoring their requests instead of trying to talk to them and if necessary terminating your agreement with the possibility of reimbursement for not being a complete tool bag about it.