Users of Facebook‘s apps — for Android, iPad and iPhone — may begin seeing ads as soon as early March, as the company looks to gain an addition revenue source before it goes public.

Sources close to the matter say Facebook has already discussed proposals with advertising agencies, according to the Financial Times. Facebook began running sponsored stories in December 2011. Featured stories will appear in the mobile news feed — similar to Twitter’s promoted tweets — mixed in with posts from your friends.

In Facebook’s paperwork for its Initial Public Offering, filed Feb. 1, the company pointed to mobile as a potential revenue source — and warned that the lack of mobile revenue was one of the things that could harm it. Nearly half of Facebook’s 845 million users access the site via mobile device.

One source told FT Facebook would incentivize advertisers to link within Facebook, rather than directing users off-site.

Facebook will hold an event for marketers in New York Feb. 29, so we can expect announcements of new ways they can use the social network. Facebook is yet to unveil Timeline brand pages, although that move is anticipated in coming weeks as Facebook rolls out Timeline for all users.

Will ads on Facebook mobile deter you from using the service? Is a smartphone screen too small for promoted stories? Let us know what you think in the comments.

Additional Facebook IPO Coverage

• Facebook Files for $5 Billion IPO
• Facebook IPO Reveals How It Made $3.71 Billion in 2011
• 10 Giant Things Less Valuable Than Facebook
• Zuckerberg to Potential Shareholders: Facebook Is on a Social Mission
• Facebook IPO Filing Flings Open the Social Network Kimono
• Facebook: Zynga Generates 12% of Our Revenue and We Need Them
• Sheryl Sandberg Was Facebook’s Best-Paid Employee in 2011

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, franckreporter

More About: Facebook, mobile ads

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News of Facebook‘s IPO swamped the Internet earlier this week, when the company’s 213-page S-1 document went up on the SEC’s website, promptly crashing it.

In addition to confirming previous reports that the filing was imminent, the document contained numerous interesting facts that many have long been wondering, such as the company’s revenue, how much Mark Zuckerberg makes, and who the company’s highest-paid employees are.

There were also several key company insights disclosed, such as the factors that Facebook considers to be risks.

Additionally, Mark Zuckerberg himself wrote a letter to potential shareholders, in which he said that Facebook was created for a “social mission – to make the world more open and connected.”

It’s a fascinating look at Facebook, but also a massive document full of legalese and complicated facts. We’ve done our best to break down the most important figures and bits of information, but now you can test yourself: how well do you know the Facebook IPO? Take our quiz below and let us know in the comments what questions you have.

More About: Facebook, facebook ipo, mark zuckerberg, Social Media

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Facebook, if nothing else, is on a social mission, wrote Mark Zuckerberg in a personal letter filed within the company’s preliminary prospectus for Initial Public Offering.

Zuckerberg’s four-page message to potential investors provides a glimpse into what the 27-year-old CEO believes are Facebook’s priorities moving forward. The letter details the mission and values of the company.

For many users, Facebook is simply a space to socialize with friends and raise digital farms. But recreational utility is far from the limits Zuckerberg — and many others — see for the social network, which unites more than 800 million users worldwide.

Facebook is a space for exchanging ideas, providing a check on authority and pushing boundaries. To create the website that facilitates such grandiose objectives, Zuckerberg wants investors to know he encourages his employees to constantly take risks, work quickly and focus on potential impact.

Zuckerberg writes that, through the power of sharing content, Facebook has the potential to increase understanding of other by people across the planet.

We parceled through Zuckerberg’s letter and pulled out 10 highlights, which we think best explain the company’s core values. What do you think of Zuckerberg’s direction? Where do you see Facebook going, now that it’s public? Share your reactions in the comments.

Uniting People

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Additional Facebook IPO Coverage

• Facebook Files for $5 Billion IPO
• Facebook IPO Reveals How It Made $3.71 Billion in 2011
• 10 Giant Things Less Valuable Than Facebook
• Zuckerberg to Potential Shareholders: Facebook Is on a Social Mission
• Facebook IPO Filing Flings Open the Social Network Kimono
• Facebook: Zynga Generates 12% of Our Revenue and We Need Them
• Sheryl Sandberg Was Facebook’s Best-Paid Employee in 2011
• Facebook: Here Are the 35 Things That Could Kill Our Company
• Facebook IPO: The Illustrated View
• Mark Zuckerberg Spent $700,000 Flying on Private Planes Last Year
• Facebook IPO: Reactions from the Social Web (and Zuckerberg)
• Will the IPO Change Facebook Forever?
• Facebook IPO: No, It’s Not Groundhog Day for the Bubble
• Facebook’s IPO: Reading Between the Lines
• The IPO Won’t Change Facebook. Online Ads Will

Image courtesy of wwwes; Flickr.

More About: Facebook, facebook ipo, mark zuckerberg

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Ah, to live the luxurious life. Facebook announced on Wednesday via its filing for an initial public offering (IPO) how the company fared in 2011, and not surprisingly, its employees racked up (and spent) big money last year.

The Facebook IPO provided details about the base salary of the team, including founder Mark Zuckerberg pulling in a salary of $483,333, plus a $220,500 bonus and “other compensation” worth $783,529.

The filing noted that he spent nearly $700,000 for costs related to private plane use “chartered in connection with his comprehensive security program and on which family and friends flew during 2011.” That includes passenger fees, fuel, crew and catering costs. Another $90,850 of that amount was for “costs related to estate and financial planning.”

Executives were under fire several years ago amid the bank bailout crisis for spending top dollar on chartering private planes. But some high-paid executives — including Steve Jobs — still made some room for traveling in luxury. In fact, flying private was one of the few luxuries the Apple founder afforded himself.

But Zuckerberg wasn’t the highest paid Facebook employee during 2011. In fact, COO Sheryl Sandberg — who earned a base salary of $300,000 — raked in $30.87 million last year.

However, if Facebook manages to raise this capital, it will be on a shortlist of the biggest tech IPOs of all time, and Zuckerberg’s net worth will skyrocket since he owns 28.4% of the company. In fact, Zuckerberg’s salary will fall to $1 annually starting Jan. 1, 2013.

Facebook — which earned $1 billion on sales of $3.7 billion in 2011 — now has 845 million active users on the site, up from the estimated 800 million using the site back in September. The company also noted that 250 million photos are uploaded daily and 2.7 billion likes and comments are made each day. Overall, there are a whopping 100 billion friendships on the site.

The full S-1 filing is available here.

Thumbnail courtesy of wwwes.

• Facebook Files for $5 Billion IPO
• Facebook IPO Reveals How It Made $3.71 Billion in 2011
• 10 Giant Things Less Valuable Than Facebook
• Zuckerberg to Potential Shareholders: Facebook Is on a Social Mission
• Facebook: Zynga Generates 12% of Our Revenue and We Need Them
• Sheryl Sandberg Was Facebook’s Best-Paid Employee in 2011

BONUS: Facebook’s Road to IPO

1. The Economy of Qatar

The country of Qatar's GDP adds up to about $98 billion.

Image courtesy of Flickr, thinkingjosh

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The time has come for another Facebook launch event, and we’re here to cover it live. Rumor has it that the social network will be launching more apps based on the Open Graph and Gestures — that is, apps that let you “verb” any “noun” (read a book, hike a trail, ride a bike and so on.)

The event starts at 5pm Pacific Time, 8pm Eastern — and we’ll be here to chat and answer questions a half-hour beforehand. Stay tuned!

More About: Facebook, Open Graph, trending

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If Facebook can host presidential debates and Twitter can host live concerts, why can’t theater appear on social media?

Berlin’s Maxim Gorki Theater proved Facebook can be home to a live theater experience Monday, in what it calls Facebook’s first performance. Twitter saw its first performance last year with the Royal Shakespeare Company’s rendition of Romeo and Juliet.

The German theater’s performance of Theodor Fontane’s Effi Briest premiered on the social network in a special adaptation for the “online Facebook stage,” Reuters reports.

“We were really pleased to try something new and innovative, and have learned a lot about how we can use the internet for our productions,” a spokesperson for the theater told Reuters, adding that the theater would consider using Facebook for future performances. “Facebook can’t replace the stage, but it offers some really interesting opportunities to perform theatre online.”

Status updates, shared photos and wall posts between characters were part of the interactive experience. Audience members voted for their favorite wedding dress option and contributed to a love letter exchanged between characters. Of course, there were periods during the show where Facebook chatter was discouraged. The performance narrator sent “silence in the theater, please,” messages, sort of like a virtual dimming of the lights.

The theater says some 1,200 people joined the Facebook group before stage admittance was closed (you can no longer gain admittance), but many others may have watched online during the production. A more traditional version of the production goes up this Saturday.

What do you think of this integration of social media into the arts? Have you seen other theaters innovating with social media?

More About: Arts, Facebook, theater

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1. Twitter: "You don't know what you're missing."

If you choose to ignore your Twitter account, you'll receive an email within a few weeks saying, "We've missed you!" More than that, Twitter lists everything you're missing out on, from the latest news to plain happiness.

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More About: Facebook, features, linkedin, Social Media, social networking, trending, tumblr, Twitter, YouTube

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Facebook apologized Monday to a reproductive rights activist who posted detailed written instructions for a Do It Yourself abortion.

The apology said the instructions were deleted on accident because they were mistakenly thought to be in violation of Facebook’s Statement of Rights and Responsibilities.

“”Our policies are enforced by a team of reviewers in several offices across the globe,” Facebook explained in its apology. “This team looks at hundreds of thousands of reports every week, and as you might expect, occasionally, we make a mistake and remove a piece of content we shouldn’t have.”

Rebecca Gomperts wrote the original post and works at Women on Web, an abortion rights group based in the Netherlands. She said Facebook deleted her original post — along with a screenshot she posted of the warning they sent to her after the original post was deleted.

“We are very happy to report that Facebook reversed its censorship of Dr. Gomperts post on how to use misoprostol for safe abortion,” the woman’s group posted on Monday. “Thank you to everyone who contacted Facebook and posted the information on your own sites in solidarity!”

Gomperts has re-posted the “how to” abortion piece on her Facebook page. The World Health Organization sanctions the instructions, which prescribe misoprostol (an ulcer drug) and mifepristone to terminate a first-term pregnancy.

This is not the first time a technology company has run afoul of pro-choice campaigners. In December, Apple’s Siri was accused of being anti-abortion after it emerged that the voice recognition assistant wouldn’t give users a list of abortion clinics when asked.

Do you think Facebook should be able to delete certain types of content? If so, which topics should Facebook not allow?

More About: censorship, Facebook

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That was apparently the message Actor Stephen Baldwin texted to big brother Alec after his in-flight Words with Friends-fueled meltdown, which led to the actor walking away from Twitter and hundreds of thousands of followers.

The younger Baldwin shared this tidbit with Mashable as he walked the red carpet at the Mission Impossible 4: Ghost Protocol premiere. Baldwin is not in the movie, so we have no idea why he was there. What we do know is that the actor, author and radio show host is a fan of Mashable. He’s also on Twitter (@StephenBaldwin7) where his verified account has almost 12k followers. Though he has only tweeted 336 or so times, Baldwin told us he likes to tweet about “pop-cultural thoughts and spiritual thoughts. I think it’s a great tool to be able to reach a lot of people in an instant.”

Baldwin seems to be something of a technophile and told us he’s an “iPhone Geek” and is on Facebook. His kids are, too. They’re teens now, but he insists they did not get on the huge social network too early.

As for his brother Alec, Baldwin said that he didn’t tell Alec anything when he dropped out of Twitter, but then offered that he may have texted him, “When you getting back on, man?” That’s what we all want to know, too, Stephen. That’s what we all want to know.

You can see the entire exchange in the video.

More About: alec baldwin, Facebook, iphone, Twitter

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Facebook will increase the distribution for Sponsored Stories by allowing them to run in the ticker across the site, ClickZ News has learned. Since the ticker — a lightweight newsfeed seen on the upper right-hand part of Facebook.com — was launched in August, the social context ads had been running only via the app ticker for Facebook games.

In an email earlier today, Annie Ta, Facebook spokesperson, said, “Starting on Monday, we are continuing to slowly roll out Sponsored Stories in [the] ticker across Facebook. Sponsored Stories help people see more relevant marketing on Facebook and they can be twice as engaging as ads on Facebook.”

The Palo Alto, CA-based digital giant launched Sponsored Stories during January, and the ad units have become an important focus of Facebook’s pitch to agencies, brands, and political marketers.

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