Facebook, Internet | featured news

Facebook’s market debut has been expected to be in mid- to late May, but a report from CNBC indicates that the process could take a little longer than analysts expected. The report, citing unnamed “people familiar with the matter,” pinpoints June as the new expected time range for the IPO and says Facebook founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has been so busy with business and acquisitions that the company hasn’t had time to put the final touches on its prep for going public.

Facebook Inc reported its first quarter-to-quarter revenue slide in at least two years, a sign that the social network's sizzling growth may be cooling as it prepares to go public in the biggest ever Internet IPO.

This story appears in the May 7 edition of Forbes magazine on page 150. Zynga, Facebook and all use an independent auditor that is simultaneously inventing the rules for social media accounting. Somewhere, Arthur Andersen is shuddering.

Stein posted comments on both his personal Facebook page and on The Armed Forces Tea Party Facebook page he created, mocking the president. On those pages he referred to President Obama as a "domestic enemy," a coward, and even superimposed President Obama's face on the poster for the movie "Jackass."

Facebook is spending $1 billion to buy the photo-sharing company Instagram in the social network's largest acquisition ever.

Facebook’s attorneys squared off Wednesday with the legal team of Paul Ceglia, a New York man who says that a 2003 contract proves he should own at least half of Facebook. Ceglia, for whom Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg did some work while at Harvard University, says he has a contract granting him at least half the ownership of Facebook. Facebook has denied the claim, saying that the contract and several other documents Ceglia provided are faked. The company subsequently filed to dismiss the suit last month.

Facebook said Tuesday that it has filed a countersuit against Yahoo, claiming that Yahoo violates Facebook patents that relate to photo-sharing, the news feed, tagging digital media and other Web elements that build in social features in Web sites.

Kimberly Hester, a grade school teacher's aide in Michigan, was fired for refusing to hand over her Facebook password to her supervisors. Hester posted a picture of a co-workers' shoes and pants bunched around her ankles on Facebook in April 2011 with the caption, "Thinking of you." She posted the picture in jest, but a parent who's on her Facebook friend list saw the image and reported it to Frank Squires Elementary where Hester was employed, prompting the investigation.

Facebook has weighed in on a practice by some businesses asking employees or job applicants for their passwords to the popular social-media site.