This is one of the greatest photo captures of a LocaModa app ever! Thanks to Gabi Porter at Metromix NY for nabbing this awesome photo at the Foursquare Mayors Ball at Thompson LES in NYC. The event proved to be a gathering of today’s Bright Young Things of Social Media, and the venue certainly provided a fitting backdrop to the action!

Because I don’t think it received nearly the attention it deserved the first time I posted about it, I wanted to pay heed to an original white paper by LocaModa Senior Systems Architect, Jacob Elder, entitled Twitter on Place Based Screens: Why It’s Not So Simple.

With the rise of place-based social media and new digital signage networks popping up everywhere, Jacob’s paper explains the complexities of real-time content display and the operational baggage that comes with it. For venues looking to integrate social media into their digital display network, it’s a must read.

Download the free full pdf version.

Last week, LocaModa announced a new white paper published by Senior Platform Architect Jacob Elder, which examines the technical and operational challenges of streaming real-time social media content on place-based screens.

Using Elder’s paper as inspiration, I wanted to point up a some of the unique features of custom LocaModa campaigns that prove why these executions aren’t as cut-and-dry as plugging in a monitor at an event and calling it a ‘feedback channel.’

1. Ability to automatically filter URLs from Twitter messages for place-based displays
According to Costin Raiu, Chief Security Expert at Kaspersky, 26% of Twitter messages contain a URL (and half of those are spam). In a standard DOOH Twitter to Screen execution (without touch screen ability), these links often serve as eyeball clutter for viewers. While some URLs within Twitter messages may be paired with enough context to make sense, the ambient nature of the application doesn’t assign them enough value to compensate for the screen real estate they occupy.

This proves particularly resonant for messages containing bit.ly links, where the context is hidden from the viewer. In a way, it’s the DOOH equivalent of going to a wine tasting with a burnt tongue and a stuffy nose.

That said, many clients choose to include links, which is their preference (we’re happy to guide the experience, but it’s up to the individual needs of the event or venue). But with one simple step in the LocaModa admin panel, all messages containing “http” or “www” or “bit.ly” can be removed.

2. Ability for a ‘Screen Reveal’
Sometimes, the background of a Twitter to Screen, Text to Screen, or Photo to Screen display is ultra cool, yet we never get to see it behind all of the streaming social media content. Enter the ‘screen reveal’ feature. Opt for this, and the messages will disperse in set intervals (1 min, 3 minutes, etc). The screen below was used for Foursquare founder Naveen’s birthday ‘prom’… we had to showcase that hot background image!

These features are available as custom LocaModa executions – Check out our App Store for a general overview of content options.

As Stephen mentioned in his Vegas recap, we were absolutely blown away by the overwhelming response to our integration with Foursquare. The TechCrunch article had over 4700 clicks in one day from bit.ly alone, not to mention 70 comments (many of them rather impassioned)! The Mashable article garnered 2500+ clicks from bit.ly in the first few hours as well… I thought we were going to see Tweetdeck burst from all of the RTs!

So what does this mean for the still emerging DOOH industry?
Was this installation DOOH’s coming out party to the mainstream tech crowd? (Hey, what better place for a par-tay than Vegas, right?)

If so, does this mean the DOOH Tipping Point is happening at the intersection of Place Based Social Media (such as LocaModa) and Location Based Services (such as Foursquare and Gowalla)?

We’re interested in hearing from the thought leaders of the industry… speak up!

The night before I left Las Vegas I walked out in the desert to look at the moon. There was a jeweled city on the horizon, spires rising in the night, but the jewels were diadems of electric and the spires were the neon of signs ten stories high. ~Norman Mailer

And with that, I’m turning the blog over to CEO Stephen Randall today for his take on this past week in Loca-Land. Take it away, Stephen…

***

Following DSE 2010 in Vegas, the LocaModa train keeps rolling along…

We used DSE as a platform to launch the industry’s first app store – dedicated to solving the problem of helping networks find revenue generating media that engages audiences, attracts advertisers and adds value to venues.

I’m happy to say that our message and proposition was received loud and clear! It’s great to see so many companies coming over to our booth and telling us that we had the exact solution they were looking for. I was also delighted to see so many inquiries coming from major networks outside the US.

We also announced our relationship and integration with Foursquare.

The Foursquare announcement was timed to coincide with our launch on another Clear Channel screen – this one happens to be the largest on the strip, outside Miracle Mile Shops. This was great timing with the DSE show less than one mile away, and various events occurring at the Paris, next to the screen. This story keeps on getting bigger for good reason. Applications like Foursquare will become the on-ramp for loyalty programs in venues and are perfect for DOOH screens. Not surprising then that both Techcrunch and Mashable covered it yesterday afternoon. You should have seen our web stats spike!

Back to DSE, where we also announced that UCView has integrated LocaModa Apps directly into their software offering (they have hundreds of licensees collectively reaching thousands of locations).

The show itself was a great success with hundreds of leads from networks globally representing tens of thousands of venues. Our booth was always well attended and our applications were also on display at UCView, Eventful and CoolSign booths, as well as being used by the event organizers as a communications tool, showing tweets, hashtags and text messages from attendees.

LocaModa’s position as thought leaders was further strengthened when it was announced that we had won two gold awards for our work – a Gold Apex award in the Hospitality category and a Gold Content award in the Interactive category. Both awards were for applications that ran on Zoom Media and Marketing’s network – which was also great news for our partners.

Luckily we managed to fly back to Boston missing the massive Nor’ Easter that dumped 18 inches of snow along the east coast and delayed flights up to New York. We made it back with no delays. Our team was great – Jake, Tim and Gabi were first timers at DSE and now know what it’s like to stand and talk to customers until you don’t have a voice. Jayne, Bill, Steve and I, are long time supporters of DSE so we already knew what to expect – but even we were very surprised by how the event went. Thanks Chris and team over at DSE.

More Vegas photos available on Gabi’s Flickr.