Text it loud & local

Springwise always enjoys simple new business ideas that somehow hook up the local, loud, inebriated offline world with the ubiquitous interaction only possible in cyberspace. Check out Wiffiti, a service that enables people to send text messages to large flat panel displays in venues such as cafes, bars and clubs. Messages sent to Wiffiti screens are also visible on the service’s website, encouraging people to text from anywhere and then watch responses from across the US, if not the world. How it works: every Wiffiti screen displays its own unique screen ID and the number to text one’s message to. Texted messages show up in seconds. Besides replying, other users can also grow or fade messages by texting commands and a message’s tag to the same screen. The first Wiffiti screen was installed in January 2006 at Someday Café in Boston, MA, a city that now has three additional Wiffiti screens. Other screens can be found in Chicago, Denver, Seattle, Knoxville, Boulder and New York. Costs for a user are the same as for sending a standard text/SMS message. Makes for a great conversation starter, pick-up tool or interactive soapbox, and should go down well in other cities and locales around the globe, especially as the rest of the world is truly SMS obsessed. And don’t forget, there’s ALWAYS money to be made the moment you figure out how to get consumers to start sending text messages.