Jumbli connecting Facebook, phones and Times Square

Another first for social media: over the past two weeks, New York City’s Times Square has been connected to a Facebook app as well as more than a thousand other locations simultaneously and in real time.

The application is called Jumbli, a multiplayer text messaging word game. Players who submit the highest scoring words from their mobile phones or online see their names and word scores on displayed on Facebook, on Clear Channel’s Jumbotron in Times Square and in 1,200 other locations including bars, cafes and restaurants across the United States.

In addition to being the first time a Facebook app has been connected in real time to public screens like this, it is also the first time a text messaging game has connected online and offline players in real-time.

“We are enabling massive audiences online and off to engage with media in a manner familiar to Web audiences,” said Stephen Randall, CEO of LocaModa, Jumbli’s developer. “Users want to control the media around them. It’s even more compelling when the user experience in social locations is connected to social networks online. It was inevitable that the power of the web would reach beyond the PC and the immediacy of the mobile phone would extend beyond the two-inch screen.”

In addition to Clear Channel’s giant screen in Times Square, participating LocaModa affiliate networks include Danoo, Ecast, Barcast and Zoom. Snoo.ws parent ICUC Moderation Services is moderating the user-generated content for Jumbli.

Harry Coghlan, President of Clear Channel Spectacolor, said the application was attractive because it was a scalable, measurable and engaging experience. “The opportunity to connect our screen to the Web is unique and enables us to augment our daily audience in Times Square with massive communities online.”

To play Jumbli in Facebook, visit it at http://apps.facebook.com/jumbli_game.