Your 3 formulations should be identical. Here's your argument:

We cannot know what information we might need in the future, therefore we must gather as much as we can and preserve all of it

My first thought when I read this is, Why are we gathering information? The answer? Because we may need it in the future. What will we need it for? Presumably to attain some other (terminal) end, since if information was a terminal end the argument wouldn't be "we may need it in the future," it would be "we need it."

Maybe I am just misunderstanding you?