Just in case you couldn't get enough of app crashes and having your mind messed with by a social network, Facebook decided to give some users a dose of both at once.
The Social Network tested a buggy app for Android designed deliberately to crash, to see if the unwitting test users would be driven away.
Sadly, they weren't. Users turned to the mobile web version instead. Ostensibly, this test had something to do with a fear that Google would block their app from the Play Store. As this seems exceptionally unlikely, a more likely explanation is that Facebook wants to see if, were they to manufacture a reason to be banned (committing a deliberate violation of Play Store rules, for example), could they get users to side load their app or even an entire separate app store.
Regardless, this is just more proof that the company regards its users as something akin to lab specimens, to be manipulated without regard to the individual harm or frustration their experiments may cause.
Testing variations on an approach meant to improve an app is acceptable, even if sometimes frustrating, but deliberately undermining the ability of their users to connect with their friends and family (and others)... well, just imagine if you found out your phone company was deliberately dropping calls as part of an experiment, and ask yourself how you'd feel about that.
All your friends are on Facebook, you say? Fat lot of good that does if it's been secretly designed to prevent you reaching them... and that doesn't sound nearly as crazy today as it did yesterday.
Next Up: A new version of their app that gives users a slight electric shock at random times? I wouldn't put it past them.
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