Facebook’s Point of No Return

As of this morning, Facebook is open to everyone. The social networking site started life as a webapp open solely to college students, then later expanded its network to include high school students, non-profit organizations and politicians. Even though Facebook has expanded its reach into new areas several times, it has always maintained a policy of exclusivity.

Now, the exclusivity that, in many users' eyes made the site special, is a thing of the past. Facebook has around 10 million users right now, and that number will surely double within the next few months. Blogger and PhD student Fred Stutzman wonders if the Facebook system will be at all relevant to the expected flood of new users who may just be looking for something similar to the MySpace experience:

It depresses me to think that Facebook is simply building Classmates.com 2.0. However, I just don't see how else I can look at this. Facebook isn't situationally relevant to its expanded sets of users, and the geographic limitations and lack of fakesters serve as hinderances to growth. Sure, a couple million people might sign on to check the service out, but are these people actually going to become first-class users? Of course not. Is Facebook simply looking for a bump in their userbase to sweeten the deal for Yahoo?

Fred has a point, and it revolves around last week's rumor that Yahoo was in acquisition talks with Facebook. It's possible that the Facebook creators realized that they needed more eyeballs if they were ever going to be a player in the social networking party. But more eyeballs means no exclusivity and less relevance to students, the site's original intended audience.

To borrow a phrase from politics, is Facebook alienating its base?

Previously:
Facebook Drops Admissions Policy
Fred Stutzman on Facebook
Facebook Faces Backalsh