Facebook

One of the things clearly worth noting about Tuesday's announcement about a $200 million investment in Facebook is the fact that it values the company at $10 billion, down a third in the 18 months since Microsoft poured $240 million into the company.

However, the fact that Facebook isn't worth $15 billion, while confirmed on Tuesday, has been pretty well understood for some time. Ever since Microsoft took its stake, there have been questions about what the social network was "really" worth.

The $200 million investment announced Tuesday came from European company Digital Sky Technologies, which … Read more

Web storage and collaboration tool Dropio has just put out a useful new way to control who can access files by using Facebook Connect. Called "friend lock," the system uses your list of Facebook friends as a simple directory that you can pick and choose from to create a white list of approved contacts.

Once you've logged in with your Facebook credentials and pick the people who you want to be able to have access, you can fire off invites that show up in their Facebook in-boxes. You can also set it up to publish a note … Read more

Updated at 5:50 p.m. PDT with plaintiff saying he will drop the lawsuit; at 2:35 p.m. with legal expert comment; at 1:15 p.m. with information from Facebook's terms of service; and at 12:30 p.m. with more details, comment, and background.

A Florida librarian and activist said on Tuesday that he will drop a civil lawsuit he filed against Facebook alleging that the social network failed to adequately protect users from a virus.

Theodore Karantsalis, of Miami Springs, Fla., was seeking $70.50 from Facebook in the lawsuit, which was filed a … Read more

Facebook announced on Tuesday a $200 million investment from Digital Sky Technologies (DST), whose social networks are market leaders in Europe.

Presuming Facebook is valued at $10 billion, DST's $200 million comes out to about a 1.96 percent stake, the companies said in a statement. DST would not have a seat on the board or hold special observer rights, the companies said.

DST also plans to offer to purchase at least $100 million of Facebook common stock from existing stockholders whose shares have vested. The details of the plan will be announced during the summer.

"This investment … Read more

Episode 33 of the Digital City, where we discuss Facebook's and Twitter's exploding traffic, Intel's billion-dollar fine, and some good and bad news for the video game industry. There are two versions of the show available now, the traditional audio stream, and our exciting, new video version -- check out both below.

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Facebook and Think Computer have settled a dispute over whether the former actually owns the term "facebook."

Under the settlement announced late Friday, Think has agreed to abandon its efforts to get the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to cancel the trademark issued to Facebook in 2006.

The story behind the dispute between Think and Facebook is a long, convoluted one. But according to the joint statement, Think founder Aaron Greenspan attended Harvard with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg earlier this decade. In 2003, Think released HouseSystem, a Web-based student portal that included a section called "The … Read more

It might be Facebook's worst-kept secret.

It's become increasingly clear in recent weeks that Facebook is finally inching toward the launch of a micropayment platform. The social site has been expanding the presence of its virtual currency, which Facebook debuted last November when it changed the monetary units for its "Gifts" product into "credits" rather than U.S. dollars.

Credits are now bundled with some promotional items in the Gifts app. And soon, select developers on the Facebook Platform will be able to start working "credits" into their own applications, in a … Read more

This one sure snuck up on us: "The Accidental Billionaires," author Ben Mezrich's presumably tawdry take on Facebook's origins, is hitting bookshelves on July 14.

Last we'd heard, it was getting released this fall.

You probably know the plot by now: Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, along with Harvard classmate Eduardo Saverin ( a co-founder who is no longer affiliated with Facebook and has had some legal beef with Zuckerberg over the years) allegedly started the site to meet women. In due time, they got rich and out of control. Or at least that's how Mezrich, … Read more

Updated at 4:20 p.m. PDT with Twitter phishing attack, at 4:10 p.m. with Facebook comment and 2:30 p.m. with attack also downloading malware onto computers.

Phishers were having a field day with Facebook and Twitter on Thursday.

A new phishing scam hit Facebook users that, like others in recent weeks, sends them to a Web site which steals their log-in information and also secretly downloads malware onto computers when they visit the malicious Web site in what is known as a "drive-by download."

Meanwhile, Twitter users were getting messages from new followers … Read more