Yesterday Facebook announced that they now have 500 million active users.  That’s pretty impressive for a company that started in 2004 as an exclusive network only open to certain schools. Facebook has come a long way though; it certainly isn’t the same Facebook I fell hard for in my freshman dorm at University of Arkansas. But what do 500 million users mean for Facebook – besides revenue and influence? Many people are speculating that this could change the future of Search. I personally don’t see that happening. Here’s why.

This week marked another interesting milestone for Facebook. For the first time, they were included in the 2010 American Customer Survey Index E-Business Report. Facebook scored 64 out of 100. The reasons for this score, according to ForeSee Results CEO Larry Freed, are “privacy concerns, frequent changes to the website, and commercialization and advertising.”  To be fair to Facebook, I think that a lot of these concerns are unwarranted. Facebook is a business, so commercialization and advertising are inevitable. As Facebook grows, so are changes to the website. Truthfully, today’s Facebook is a much better format than it was in 2004, especially considering how much more content is on each profile, though every change to the user interface rallies thousands of users rejecting the changes.  I think the problem most people have boils down to the fact that Facebook today isn’t Facebook circa 2004, and for a lot of people, not the Facebook they signed up for initially.

When I signed up, I was able to post anything I wanted for my friends old and new to see, but most importantly, I could do so (seemingly) without consequence. Great hook for college kids, right? Then, employers started checking Facebook profiles: strike 1. Facebook later became open to high school students: BIG strike two, and in my opinion, the first time Facebook did something “uncool”. Eventually, Facebook became open to anybody and everybody, including mothers and grandmothers everywhere: strike 3; I’m out. But not really – I can’t leave Facebook. Professionally and socially, Facebook provides a service I can’t find anywhere else online, so I’m stuck with a measly profile and a handful of appropriate pictures.  Facebook has become a chore, not enjoyment.

I’ll admit that I’m skeptical of Facebook’s third-party applications (and privacy settings and open graph and Facebook for websites and…), so I’m not getting the full Facebook experience. But like I said earlier, that’s not the Facebook I signed up for. A lot of my peers share this sentiment and that score of 64 shows that it’s likely more than just my peers.  But, since there isn’t an alternative, we stay, unhappily, on Facebook. Scott Stratten of UnMarketing just wrote a great post about customer loyalty and how a company shouldn’t ignore loyal customers. Facebook has 500 million (unwillingly) loyal customers.  I think if a worthy alternative pops up on the web (here’s looking at you, Diaspora), Facebook would see how disloyal its users are when a mass exodus occurs. They can ask MySpace about that. Remember MySpace? They were a big deal in 2004…

Satisfaction isn’t low all over the web though. Google, Bing, and Yahoo received 80, 77 and 76 respectively in ForeSee Results survey. I think this shows customers still trust search. To most people, search hasn’t changed that drastically. From a search marketing perspective I can attest that search changes daily, sometimes so fast I work with my running shoes on. People love social media – I know I sure do – and it can offer a whole lot, but, at the end of the day, Search is an institution. There’s been great competition that has truly benefited users as search results are more fine-tuned for location, search history, etc. It will be a long time before Social Media can give me better, unbiased results for an inquiry than Search, and with Facebook’s current customer satisfaction, I don’t think they’ll be the powerhouse to take down Search.

Do you think Facebook will change the future of Search? Sound off in comments.