Drew Burden

I’m glad to see that Facebook finally cleared up their bad blood with Google and at least put some sort of official app out on the Android Market. One small problem: it sucks horribly.

This is pretty much all you get. You can see your News Feed, your own wall, and you can upload photos from your phone. I hate to say it, but Android users once again get the short end of the stick. (Compare Facebook for iPhone.) That said, there are some features thrown in there that I do like.

Home screen widget

I will admit, this is very nice. It updates ever so often and lets you scroll through recent status updates. You can post new statuses yourself from here, and visit other walls, comment, et cetera.

Phonebook live folder

This is probably the coolest feature of the app. You can place a link to a live folder on your home screen of all your friends who have phone numbers saved on the site. Open this folder, tap a contact, and you get a choice of phone numbers to call or text.

I’ve been waiting for a Facebook app for a long time. Now that I finally have it, I feel like Facebook is not paying as much attention to the Android sector as it should be. They’re leaving the door open for a potentially poorly-implemented third-party app to take away all the glory. Even the most horrible trainwreck of a social networking site has a decent, actively-developed, and above all usable Android app. I’ll be waiting for the next version. I can only hope that Facebook changes my opinion.