Social software and mobile social networking took center stage at yesterday’s Mobile Monday in Düsseldorf, where over 100 showed up to hear senior execs from mabber.com, Plazes, Nimbuzz, SoonR and Sulake Deutschland GmbH (better known as part of the company behind Habbo) talk shop and strategy. Companies didn’t use the forum to make announcements or reveal revenues, but they did offer a valuable sneak peek into their mobile plans.

Nico Lumma, Mabber.com founder, outlined his roadmap for his universal messaging offer (combining mobile, Web and desktop IM from all the usual suspects) and revealed increasing interest from content companies to cash in on his ability to deliver content alerts via a new scheme that “works like a mobile newsletter, but a lot faster.” He’s currently in discussions with several major German newspaper publishers, as well as niche content owners who want to deliver SMS alerts on specific sports and entertainment events.

In a nutshell, Mabber allows content distribution in real-time by creating “nodes” and attaching the publisher’s content to them. Users subscribe to the node (which could belong to content owner) and receive fresh content each time Mabber updates the node. “All users who are subscribed get a message sent to them. It’s similar to getting an RSS feeds from a news source.” But there’s a twist: This live ticker-like SMS alert content comes at no cost to the publisher because Mabber “reverses the cost structure” through its network of nodes.

Habbo is focussed on extending its social community to mobile, and is investigating partnerships to bring members IM and other functions via its mobile client. (The client is currently in beta in Finland and set to launch in 2Q2007 in Germany.) The company is rather lukewarm on mobile content. Its Habbo-related content (ringtone, wallpaper etc…) offer via the Web has registered a “modest and low” response from members, Thorsten Jüngling, Sulake’s country manager, told me. There are also no plans to monetize eyeballs; mobile advertising would be distracting and the company doesn’t need the revenue stream.

SoonR, which interfaces with desktop search to let road warriors access all content on their PCs via mobile, sees the chance to make a bid for a consumer audience. In that scenario, users could access content stored on their PCs and a special share function built into the solution would allow them distribute their content to their buddies (and no doubt link that all in with Soonr’s IM, Skype and chat capabilities). Peter Engelbrecht, SoonR VP Business Development, hinted his company could go beyond connecting users and user-gen content to providing more packaged content offers, which operators could also brand as their own. The content-anywhere service could be charged at a monthly subscription or as part of a micro-payment per use scheme. Looks like it’s time to make room for more companies in the mobile social networking niche. Social software providers are making the move from providing the plumbing to providing content – and their focus on open standards (Mabber) and cheap communications (Nimbuzz) gives them the clout (and the cost structure) to provide content to a mass audience.