It's not just Digital Sky Technologies that is in "no rush" for Facebook to go public -- Facebook's founder says he's happy to take his time, too. CEO Mark Zuckerberg, according to the Wall Street Journal is putting his head together with those of Paul Otellini, CEO of Intel (INTC) and Charles Phillips, president of Oracle (ORCL) to gain insights on running his company, over which he'll have more control as a result of Facebook's dual-class share structure. If Zuckerberg gets his way, he'll run Facebook for a while before taking the dive into public capital markets.

Zuckerberg tells the Wall Street Journal(subscription required), "We're going to go public eventually, because that's the contract that we have with or investors and our employees." Doubtless, these two parties are eager to experience a liquidity event, particularly those from the company's earliest days and preliminary financing rounds.

Are you still suspicious of the $6.5 billion Facebook valuation that resulted from Digital Sky's $100 million investment last July? And doubtless, the $15 billion valuation implied by Microsoft's (MSFT) 2007 investment in the company was, to say the least, aspirational. Well, the insanity is continuing to mount – throughout the Facebook ecosystem. A recent report by Global Silicon Valley Partner's NeXt Up Research organization puts the price tag of Zinga, the Facebook application developer, at a whopping $3.3 billion ... half of Facebook's!

Granted, Zynga has done a few things to wow social media market-wachers and investors. NeXt Up Research forecasts 35% growth for this company over the next four years and just upped its 2014 revenue projection to $1.1 billion. The previous estimate was only $460 million. What could possibly justify these numbers? Well, Zynga has grown from 30 million users to 230 million in only 10 months, largely as a result of the strength shown by Facebook over this period. Farmville has been the company's engine, with close to 80 million monthly active users.

If Mark Zuckerberg knew then what he knows now ... Facebook would be more like MySpace, which is now owned by News Corp. (NWS). And, he's willing to admit this in public.

In a six-minute on-stage interview with TechCrunch, Zuckerberg went on at length about the social media platform's privacy settings, which have been the subject of unending debate. He says that he'd make more data public by default if he could start Facebook again. Though Zuckerberg cites Internet trends that indicate a reduced concern with privacy, the real reasons are more likely financial.

Facebook could use more older women, not to mention younger people in general. As the company pushes toward what is expected to be an IPO in 2010, it needs to shore up its user base in all demographics, if for no other reason than to diversify against a new social media platform that appeals to a specific community. So, even with the site pushing past 100 million monthly active users according to its advertising tool, with the addition of 5 million in December, there is work to be done if Facebook will make a successful entry into the public market.

Long derided by "serious folk" as a place for kids, Facebook's membership consists mostly of adults. Fifty-six percent of the user base is female, and 60% of users are 25 years of age or above. In fact, 20% of them are at least 45 years old. Some of the groups that are underrepresented are showing rapid growth. Men over 55 grew twice as fast as their female counterparts, though the younger generation moved onto Facebook most aggressively last year. Users age 26 to 34 showed the biggest overall increase in 2009, with 839,000 monthly active users. This represents a substantial shift from the trend earlier in the year, in which it was the later generation flocking to Facebook. Women over 55 didn't jump on the bandwagon as quickly as other groups.

Digital Sky Technologies may be looking to grow its online empire a little bit. The Russian investment firm is said to be making a play for Aol's (AOL) ICQ instant messaging service. A report in the Wall Street Journal, which cites sources familiar with the talks, says that the discussions are still in early stages. And, in case Digital Sky doesn't bite, Aol is exploring options with other companies. The WSJ puts the possible sale price at $200 million to $300 million.

Back in July, Digital Sky pumped another $100 million into Facebook, paying $14.77 a share for the privilege of investing in the white-hot social media company which could be setting the stage for an initial public offering next year.

Privately held social network Facebook just saw its prices go higher. Digital Sky Technologies has announced it will pay $14.77 a share for an additional stake in the social network, bumping its total position in the company to up to 3.5%. If this deal is completed, it would imply a total value of $6.5 billion – down about one-third from Digital Sky's last investment in Facebook.

Even the $6.5 billion a share value is optimistic. Investors have pushed the value to below $5 billion in private secondary market transactions over the past few weeks. Nonetheless, the relatively new company is still valued well above major technology and media heavyweights, including CBS (NYSE: CBS) with a $4.06 billion market cap and SalesForce.com (NYSE: CRM) at a $4.72 billion market cap.