Facebook on the stock ticker: LIKE? POKE? TMI?   Getty Images
Posted: 02/01/2012   As the social network prepares to go public
and raise billions, it must also pick a brief code - the handful
of letters that will be as closely identified with Facebook on
Wall Street as the blue strip is on your computer screen.  FACE
is already taken by a cosmetics company, though BOOK is up for
grabs.  A clever ticker symbol can be like a vanity plate,
helping investors remember your company. Snagging a coveted one-
letter symbol - think "C" for Citigroup, formerly for Chrysler -
is a status symbol in certain nerdy realms.  Most companies skew
toward the boring, though there are exceptions. Mattress company
Sealy is ZZ. Shoe seller Steven Madden is SHOO. Southwest
Airlines is LUV, a nod toward Love Field airport in its hometown
of Dallas. Veterinary hospital chain VCA Antech Inc. is WOOF, a
nod toward - well, you get it.  When a company wants to go
public, it reserves a ticker symbol with the Nasdaq, the New
York Stock Exch