5G roadblock: labor

Sat Jan 4 05:31:14 UTC 2020

On 3/Jan/20 23:53, Sabri Berisha wrote:

> That depends on where we are. Most of the time it is at home, over wi-fi. 
> However, sometimes they chat while my daughter is walking to school. At
> some point, I worked in SoCal while the family still lived in the Bay Area. 
> Very often, grandpa kept her entertained in the back of the car while
> the misses focused on the road ahead of her in the central valley. 
>
> But the point was that while some never use video calling, others do so very
> often.

Which was my point - you and the family are on those devices most of the
time when on wi-fi (more bandwidth, no data caps, less cost).

The ride/walk between home and school when your daughter is online with
grandpa is short enough that it doesn't cost much to have that over the
GSM network for the duration. Now, if the ride/walk was 24hrs, that'd be
another story.

> I don't know about you, but I rarely use those. My T-Mobile plan has
> unlimited data and coverage is adequate for me. It even works abroad, so
> unless I need high speed data I'm fine with the included 256kbps.
> Surprisingly, that's good enough for facetime.

Hell, if an unlimited plan is 256Kbps, sign the whole world up :-). I
think any MNO selling 4G @ 256Kbps unlimited can manage that.

I'm not sure they are willing to sell 4G @ 50Mbps unlimited.

>
> I predict that there will be a time where, just like POTS lines were
> exchanged for cellular phones, people will disconnect their cable internet
> and rely on 6g or 7g alone. And probably still with IPv4 addresses.

I don't think so, not unless GSM receivers are cheaper to install in all
fixed and mobile devices than wi-fi and Ethernet, and not unless MNO's
are going to offer unlimited data service at high bandwidth.

It's the kids, Sabri, and judging from your daughter's online behaviour,
you can see it too :-).

Mark.