Zuckerberg faces new Facebook action

by Media Week, Media Week 22-Apr-08

A former college classmate of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is taking legal action against the billionaire entrepreneur seeking to cancel Facebook's legal claim to its name.

In a petition filed with the US Patent and Trademark Office, Aaron
Greenspan claims that Zuckerberg has no right to trademark the Facebook
name, because the term had been used generically for years at Harvard

University.

Greenspan further claims that he used the term "Face Book" as part of an
online service called houseSYSTEM, before Zuckerberg launched Facebook
social networking operation 2004.

The legal action is not the first time that Zuckerberg has faced
challenges to his social networking empire.

For the past four years, a trio of Zuckerberg's former college
classmates have been disputing Facebook's origin.

They allege in a lawsuit that Zuckerberg stole the social networking
concept from them.