This week should be a celebratory milestone for Facebook - the world's largest social network just keeps getting larger and larger, although founder Mark Zuckerberg has admitted that growth has slowed in recent months. Instead of a celebratory atmosphere, though, Facebook is caught up in the midst of what may turn out to be the ugliest ownership fracas in the company's history - andthat's saying a lot, considering that Facebook has given lucrative ownership stakes to multiple individuals who claim that Zuckerberg copied key concepts and even code to create Facebook.

The latest ownership fiasco involves a contract which Mark Zuckerberg may or may not have signed back in 2004, which may or may not have given as much as 84% of ownership over the social network to a man named Paul Ceglia, who claims he hired Zuckerberg to create Facebook back in 2004 in exchange for a 50% ownership of the site. Ceglia's lawyers claim that they have a contract and other supporting documentation to back up their claims, although Facebook's lawyers say they strongly suspect that contract is a forgery.

It's a juicy legal battle that comes on the eve of the launch of the so-called "Facebook movie," The Social Network, which tells the story of Zuckerberg's rise to glory in the mid 2000's, a story rife with betrayal, double-crosses and seedy strip clubs. Ceglia's lawyer says it's a story so compelling that it might well become the basis for a movie in and of itself - and if Ceglia's claims are even half true, that's an understatement.

According to the documentation (some of which is provided below for your approval), Ceglia contracted Mark Zuckerberg through Craigslist back in 2004 to do development work for him; one of the projects the young programmer was hired to do, say Ceglia's lawyers, was a site called "The Face Book," which Zuckerberg was paid $1000 for and given a 50% share in the company. For each day that the work was late, Ceglia was to receive an additional 1% of ownership, giving him a total ownership share of 84% of the company, if his claims are true.

That's huge, although ultimately this case might boil down to a completely different issue than the question of whether or not the contract is legitimate or not. Facebook's lawyers are likely to focus on the so-called doctrine of laches, which provides legal protection for defendents against plaintiffs waiting for something to gain value before suing for it later. Considering that Ceglia took over six years to file his case against Zuckerberg, it's going to be difficult for him and his lawyers to claim that this isn't exactly what he did, and Facebook's lawyers are likely to sieze on this issue to discredit Ceglia or even have the case thrown out.

No matter how the case resolves itself, it's unlikely that Paul Ceglia is going to end up owning 84% of Facebook. What's far more likely is that Facebook will settle with him, either with a bulk monetary payment or with a smaller stake in the company, both of which it has done in the past. Facebook's lawyers claim that Ceglia's attorney has already offered to make the situation go away in exchange for "hush money," although Ceglia's lawyers claim that no settlement has been discussed.

Who knows? Maybe this thing will be interesting enough to warrant "The Social Network 2: Ceglia's Revenge."