Jan 19, 2011 5:38 PM

Got a Candy Bar Phone? There's a Facebook App for That.

While it may come as little surprise, Facebook wants you to be using its services no matter what phone you are on or what country you are in. On Wednesday, the mammoth social networking company announced that it has a new app for so-called feature phones, a nice term for traditional or dumb mobile phones, […]

While it may come as little surprise, Facebook wants you to be using its services no matter what phone you are on or what country you are in.

On Wednesday, the mammoth social networking company announced that it has a new app for so-called feature phones, a nice term for traditional or dumb mobile phones, and has partnered with nine international carriers to offer free of data access charges for the first 90 days after the launch.

Facebook is firmly in place on smart phones, including the iPhone, and its mobile now preinstalled on some versions of Android. But Facebook aims to be the center of people's online lives around the world, including countries where smart phones aren't nearly as ubiquitous as they are in the U.S. and Europe.

The app works on more than 2,500 devices manufactured by Nokia, Sony and Ericsson and LG, the company said in a blog post Wednesday. It allows users to sync their phone and Facebook contacts, scroll through photos, send Facebook messages and read updates.

Carriers included in the launch are Dialog (Sri Lanka), Life (Ukraine), Play (Poland), StarHub (Singapore), STC (Saudi Arabia), Three (Hong Kong), Tunisiana (Tunisia), Viva (Dominican Republic), and Vodafone (Romania).

Others that are launching soon are: Mobilicity (Canada), Reliance (India) Telcel (Mexico), TIM (Brazil), Vivacom (Bulgaria).

The deals are necessary since, unlike with smart phones, apps can't be added to feature phones without the approval of carriers, an arrangement that stunted the mobile marketplace until Apple broke that grip with the iPhone.

Facebook has a dominant grasp on social networking in the U.S. and Europe, but has yet to conquer the globe on people's identities (though if social networking were a game of Risk, I'd prefer to be Facebook right now).

For instance, Facebook faces strong competition from homegrown social networks in Russia and Mainland China, which are notably absent from the list of partners (with the exception of Three in Hong Kong).