The big wireless story of the past week, without a doubt, has been the $99-all-you-can-eat-mobile-voice-minutes land grab.

First out of the box came Verizon, then AT&T and finally T-Mobile -- with Sprint apparently still to come. These new offers come as the wireless industry is already feeling the affect of one major trend -- increased mobile data usage -- and sits poised to feel the impact of another in the form of emerging “open” wireless networks.

These changes -- large in their own right -- won’t happen in isolation.

Moving users to higher-commitment plans could increase average revenue per user with little impact on the network. But increased mobile data usage -- typically offered via unlimited plans today -- will have a major impact on the network, and could push mobile data plans back toward metered usage. Meanwhile, open networks and open handsets -- not to mention the incredible (yet still untapped) revenue potential of mobile advertising -- will no doubt disrupt the traditional subsidy and bounty relationships that today rule the wireless hardware, software and network sectors.

The pricing and service conundrums facing the wireless industry today mirror -- and are at least part driven by -- similar challenges on the Web, where business models (even successful ones like Google) often seem cobbled together with string and wire and a bit of magic dust.

So it would behoove wireless service providers to take a close read of the new Wired magazine, where editor Chris Anderson -- of “long-tail” fame -- begins to explore his next book topic, which he dubs “free-onomics,” or the economics of free. Anderson outlines a “taxonomy of free,” or six models for building a digital business with free as a major component: freemium; cross-subsidies; (a teleco favorite, for better or worse); advertising; zero marginal change; gift economy; and labor exchange.

Above all, he writes, “free is not quite as simple -- or as stupid -- as it sounds. Just because products are free doesn't mean that someone, somewhere, isn't making huge gobs of money.” The obvious example on the Web is Google, which Anderson describes as profiting by figuring out how to turn reputation (PageRank) to attention (traffic) to money (ads) -- an equation that puts it in the role of “central banker for these new [Web] economies.”

It won’t be easy to find a similar killer formula for wireless -- taking into account shrinking voice margins, rising data usage, changing user requirements, emerging content and advertising opportunities and more -- but doing so will be key to success in the rapidly evolving mobile economy.

E-mail me at rkarpinski@telephonyonline.com.