The New York Post reports that Google is currently leading Microsoft in the quest to win a 5-10% stake in Facebook for $500 million to $1.5 billion (depending on what exorbitant pre-money valuation Facebook gets). According to the Post's source at Microsoft, however, Redmond is "willing to give any valuation possible" to keep Google from nabbing a stake in the hot social networking startup.

It's hard not to take the NY Post story with a grain a salt, though, given that Post reporter Peter Lauria has been quite wrong about this type of rumor before. Both Google's and Microsoft's interest in Facebook is based on the potential for a large amount of advertising dollars that can be made in social networking. Microsoft has often been presumed to be the front-runner, given their current advertising deal with Facebook. Either way, one of these companies seems like to invest a large amount of money in the social network.