Winklevoss Twins have lost their court battle with the Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. The Winklevoss Twins, aka Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, must now accept the $65m cash and stock settlement offered by the social networking site. The twins had argued that the deal was unfair because Facebook had hidden information from them during talks, reports the UK's Guardian newspaper.
The initial court battle became the focus of the OSCAR winning movie 'The Social Network', with the Winklevoss Twins being played by Armie Hammer. The 6ft 5in brothers began a company called 'ConnectU' while studying at Harvard. They insist that Zuckerberg stole their idea and founded 'Facebook'. However, the US Circuit Court of Appeals Chief Judge Alex Kozinski gave a unanimous opinion in court, saying, "The Winklevosses are not the first parties bested by a competitor who then seek to gain through litigation what they were unable to achieve in the marketplace. They made a deal that appears quite favourable in light of recent market activity. At some point, litigation must come to an end. That point has now been reached". Facebook took in $1.2 billion of revenue in 2010's first nine months, valuing the company at around $50 billion. The Winklevoss twins argued that she should have received more Facebook shares as part of their $65m settlement.
Mark Zuckerberg will now turn attention to the New York businessman Paul Ceglia, who claims a contract with the Facebook founder to develop and design a website entitled him to a huge 84% stake in the social networking site.