(4 February 2009 11:20 pm)

MUMBAI: Facebook, the social networking site which 150 million users worldwide can't do without celebrates its fifth birthday on 4 February. And it did it in style. Says Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in his blog on Facebook: "To express our appreciation, we've created a "Thank You" gift, which will be available tomorrow (4 February) in the Facebook Gift Shop for you (Facebookers) to give freely to others".

When Zuckerberg started Facebook in 2004 from a dorm in Harvard, the target audience was Harvard students only. Today, however, half its members are not at university and the fastest growing segment of users are those over 30. And more women over 55 seem to love it, logging growth of 175% since September 2008, according to InsideFacebook.

Close to 15 million users daily post photos, videos, status updates, messages on their friends state of being, birthday wishes, messages to groups to fight causes, and play online games. Facebook is used for many activities and for friends new and old to stay connected; typically they stay on the site for two hours a day.

The company is expected to generate lower revenues then expected this year thanks to the recession. Zuckerberg admits that building and moving quickly for five years hasn't been easy, "and we aren't finished. The challenge motivates us to keep innovating and pushing technical boundaries to produce better ways to share information."

But the company's past is coloured by accusations from Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, and Divya Narendra, three classsmates at Harvard who claimed that Zuckerberg stole the idea for Facebook from them. Their claim came to light first in a suit in September 2004 and then later in 2007.

Their claim dates back to 2002, when the three classmates allegedly dreamed up an online social network they were going to call Harvard Connection (subsequently renamed ConnectU). They asked Zuckerberg to do the programming. The three claimed Zuckerberg stole their ideas and source code to build his own social network. The case was settled in June 2008 and Facebook agreed to pay an undisclosed amount of cash and stock.

The piece de resistance was when Zuckerberg sold a 1.6 per cent stake in Facebook in October 2007 to Microsoft Corp for $240 million. That valued the company at about $15 billion and gave Zuckerberg status as probably the youngest self-made billionaire in history. Not bad for a 25 year old bloke.