Greg Sterling has written up a very interesting proofpoint for Recombinant Telephony on his Screenwerk blog, which also provides a link to a YouTube demo. What you’ll see is the transformation of one’s Facebook profile and status indicators into elements of CallerID delivered to a smartphone.

The transformation of social media (like Facebook and Twitter) from stand-alone (though open) communication exchanges into powerful portals into telephony was first exposed to me by Stuart Henshall and his Phweet service. This YouTube video is Stuart’s presentation at eComm 2009 a few months back. Where Yellix simplifies the process of receiving a friends Facebook status when they phone you, Phweet turns Twitter into a powerful tool for mutually-agreed-upon call initiation. In effect, two Twitterers can toggle from text-based interaction to a full-blown phone conversation by adding a URL and invite to a Tweet.

Yellix and Phweet are but two examples of how traditional phone calls will be integrated into social media. The new services exhibit certain game-like qualities which has the potential to turn passive wireless subscribers into more aware and active phone users. I, personally, believe they will find such services engaging, especially as new applications add location-awareness, ad-hoc conference calling and, inevitably, the two foundations of e-commerce – permissions-based marketing messages and transactional capabilities.

This is very early days, in terms of the traditional adoption curve for new technologies (or in this case integration of old technologies with the new). Wireless subscribers are scarcely aware of all the features, functions and services that their handsets are capable of delivering. Routine use and refinement of such services can only start after there’s broader promotion, awareness and acceptance.

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