Mitch Wagner writes, “My colleague Iain Morris takes a hammer to 5G hype in an article that’s so, so good. The world went bonkers in 2019 and 5G hype is part of that. Yes, 5G is inevitable, Iain notes. And it will prove useful. But it’s not the miracle technology it’s being hyped as. ”
Above all, the telecom industry continued to polish the turd that is 5G. Rarely has a technology generated so much industry hype and met with such a blasé response from the broader market. Watch your neighbor’s eyes glaze over when you describe its higher speeds and lower latency. Note how he fails to share your excitement when you tell him it will provide extra capacity and reduce costs for service providers.The industry, if not the consumer, seems to be living in 1999, another mad year for technology when IT nerds convinced company bosses that a millennium date change in computer systems would reset clocks, wipe out records and trigger the end of civilization. That year also marked the eve of 3G, which promised a mobile Internet revolution but couldn’t work up the subsequent effort. Operators are now switching it off.
While 4G quietly cleaned up 3G’s mess, with a helping hand from Apple and other gadget makers, 5G is neither fixing a consumer problem nor delivering a new experience.
2019: The Year Telecom Went Doolally About 5G [Iain Morris/Light Reading]