Facebook just updated its iPhone app. Great!

That's no consolation to its employees, who are increasingly getting nudged, cajoled, and even ordered to give up their iPhones for Android devices.

We dug into the reason for the corporate directive, and the answer we got—from a handful of ex-Facebookers and others familiar with Facebook's plans—surprised us.

It's not some new spat with Apple or an attempt to cozy up to Google, which makes the Android operating system.

Instead, Facebook management realizes its Android app is subpar—and believes that the only way employees will take fixing it seriously is if they have to deal with its issues day in, day out.

It's a practice called "dogfooding," from the phrase "eating your own dog food," which is pretty common at tech companies.

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