Information wants to be monetized. But it loves to destroy.

Does information want to be free? Please. Do I sell cartoon balloons in town? No, I don't. And information does not want to be free. Ever. Only the deliberately ignorant believe otherwise. If you give information away, you better have a means of making even more money based on information gleaned from giving away that other information. Or perish.

Information wants to be parsed, aggregated, packaged, accessed, distributed, secreted and a host of other things, but it always wants to be monetized. Anywhere information is free, it is so only because no one has yet figured out, or has the tools, to extract more value from that information then someone else has by giving it away. Which is why two events from this weekend reveal the potential far-reaching opportunities, and the destructive power, built upon business models that know when to charge for information, how much, and why.

First, we learned that Android surpassed Nokia/Symbian in smartphone sales this past quarter (Q4 10). The smartphone is the computer. Despite its billions, its bureaucracy, its past, Google was smart enough and flexible enough to realize that they had to *thrive* on the smartphone if they were to have a future. Part of that strategy was to buy and re-build and give away Android. The net effect of this, I suspect, will be to ensure that all Android handset makers see their profit margins on devices grind down toward zero. Plus, I'm not convinced this is even the best strategy for Google. Perhaps all the money and people and resources would serve them better if they focused exclusively on Google services that would work great on all smartphone platforms. But make no mistake. Google does not give away Android, nor Google Maps, nor voice search nor email, etc. etc. etc. out of the goodness of their heart, which I'm not even sure they have. They give away these streams of information because they can make far more money, for now, by charging others (advertisers) for other information.

That other information is you, obviously, and your searches and your emails and your location and trips, etc. etc. etc. It is extremely doubtful that anyone will best Google in these various services, at least during this decade. Meaning that Google can continue pouring money into these services and into Android, keeping it free while making even more money on other information. And likely ensuring the destruction of Nokia, whose operating system probably is not as good and who cannot give it away to any handset makers, in like numbers, because they do not have information that is as valuable as Google. Until they do, there will be no hope for them. They are doomed. Unless, of course, they or some other company or group of companies figures out how to extract more value from the pieces of Google's information stream that Google currently does not charge for. Until then,

The other announcement this week was that Amazon was planning to roll out a subscription-based video streaming service. At launch, the service will be avaiable -- for free -- to Amazon Prime subscribers. This is a direct attack on Netflix. It was Netflix that beat the cable companies and television networks at their own game. These old-school dynasties know a good deal about each of their end users. But there was so much more to learn. Pumping out a batch of content is fine, but there are opportunities to optimize this information, which Netflix has done better than anyone. What movie do I want to watch -- right now. On what device? What do I want to watch, at any time, and in ranked order? Who, exactly, are my favorite performers? No sci fi channel or comedy channel or soap opera channel, which vomits out content, can compete with this.

Netflix has a great brand, a great distribution model. But the information enabled them to usurp many in the industry and they are now the leader in streaming premium content. And have an exceptional valuation for this. A competitor could attempt to undercut Netflix; charge 25% less, for example. Possible, but given all that valued information Netflix possesses, this probably will not succeed. A competitor will have to offer similar services at essentially zero cost.

Which should not be possible. After all, information wants to be monetized. Yes, but maybe someone else possesses information that may be worth even more, at leats to them. Amazon hopes that they can make more money than lose by adding customers to their Amazon Prime service, and by offering them more opportunities to access the Amazon service, buy from them and their partners.

Could Amazon wipe out Netflix? Could Android completely destroy Nokia? Yes. And both because they have made the competitor's information less valuable, and their's more valuable, sometimes by making it available for free, sometimes by charging for it. Facebook is free. If, for example, it's free information -- our individual and collective social graph -- ultimately becomes more valuable to advertisers, all those great 'free' services Google offers will go away. Because the 'free' information services they provide us are delivering more value to advertisers. Once that is changed, that information will have to be charged for, monetized.  But because of other revenue streams, it becomes difficult to ever know how much your information is worth, how much a competitor's information is worth, how much its value will change even over the short-term.

I do not know how this will play out or where it will end. It is obvious that information wants to be monetized, but that, no surprise, some information is more valuable to others. The scary part for every business, it seems, is this value is constantly shifting. Some new information stream or business model or funding opportunity enables someone to come along and make it impossible for you to continue charging for something, or not charging for it. Even giving away information is under direct assault.

As more people get smartphones, and join in the real-time smart social mobile web, these changes in value and funding sources and improved methods of monetization and newer ways of parsing and packaging information are likely to accelerate into hyperdrive. It may become impossible to hold onto any business or business model, at least in the digital realm, for more than a handful of years.

The smartphone wars will spare no one.