Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

5G networks meet consumer needs as mobile data growth slows

spectrum.ieee.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 376 posts

Re: 5G networks meet consumer needs as mobile data growth slows

#171

Post by jethro_tell »

therein wrote: post #136
hedora wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It actually works well in most places. Look up the term “common carrier”. The trick is that the entity that owns the wires has to provide/upgrade the network at cost, and anyone has the right to run a telco on top of the network. This creates competition for things like pricing plans, and financial incentives for the companies operating in the space to compete on their ability to build out / upgrade the network (or t…

It also makes it more vulnerable to legal, bureaucratic and technical threats. Doesn't make much sense to me to abstract away most of the parts where an entity could build up its competitive advantage and then to pretend like healthy competition could be build on top. Imagine if one entity did all the t-shirt manufacturing globally but then you congratulated yourself for creating a market based on altered colors and…

This was a common way to do things before the telcos in the USA were deregulated in the 2000s and 2010s. At the time it was both internet and telephone but due to the timing of de regulation, it never really took off with real high speed internet, only dsl and dialup.

I used to work at a place that did both on top of the various telcos. We offered ‘premium service’ with 24 hour customer support and a low customer to modem and bandwidth ratio.

Most of our competitors beat us in price but would only offer customers support 9-5 and you may get a busy signal/ lower bandwidth in the back haul during peak hours.

There was a single company that owned the wires and poles, because it’s expensive and complex to build physical infrastructure and hard to compete, but they were bared from selling actual services or undercutting providers because of their position. (Which depended on jurisdiction).

It solved the problem we have now of everyone complaining about their ISP but only having one option in their area.

We have that problem now specifically because we deregulated common carriers for internet right as it took over the role of telephone service.

Re: 5G networks meet consumer needs as mobile data growth slows

#172

Post by vel0city »

aceazzameen wrote: post #170
viraptor wrote: post #147

> Could maximum data speeds—on mobile devices, at home, at work—be approaching “fast enough” for most people for most purposes? That seems to be the theme across all consumer electronics as well. For an average person mid phones are good enough, bargain bin laptops are good enough, almost any TV you can buy today is good enough. People may of course desire higher quality and specific segments will have higher needs,…

The answer is yes. But it's not just about speed. The higher speeds drain the battery faster. I say this because we currently use an old 2014 phone as a house phone for the family. It's set to 2G to take calls, and switches to 4g for the actual voice call. We only have to charge it once every 2-3 weeks, if not longer. (Old Samsung phones also had Ultra Power Saving mode which helps with that) 2G is being shutdown tho…

There are some more traditional home phones which work on 4/5G networks with a DECT handset which talks to a cellular base station. You might look into switching to that model to replace your "cell phone as a home phone" concept. It makes it a bit easier to add another handset to the DECT network and often means convenient cradles to charge the handsets while the base station stays in a good signal spot with plenty of power.

Just a thought when it comes time to change out that device.

Re: 5G networks meet consumer needs as mobile data growth slows

#173

Post by celsoazevedo »

hedora wrote: post #133
pr337h4m wrote: post #88

>Regulators may also have to consider whether fewer operators may be better for a country, with perhaps only a single underlying fixed and mobile network in many places—just as utilities for electricity, water, gas, and the like are often structured around single (or a limited set of) operators. There are no words to describe how stupid this is.

It actually works well in most places. Look up the term “common carrier”. The trick is that the entity that owns the wires has to provide/upgrade the network at cost, and anyone has the right to run a telco on top of the network. This creates competition for things like pricing plans, and financial incentives for the companies operating in the space to compete on their ability to build out / upgrade the network (or t…

Common carriers have some upsides, but one downside is that it sometimes removes the incentive for ISPs to deploy their own networks.

I was stuck with a common carrier for years. I could pick different ISPs, which offered different prices and types of support, but they all used the same connection... which was only stable at lower speeds.

Re: 5G networks meet consumer needs as mobile data growth slows

#174

Post by throw0101c »

Marsymars wrote: post #108
throw0101c wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have just never had need of any significant internet speed on my phone. I don't download things, and only sometimes stream video. But other people do. And the main resource that is limited with cell service is air time: there are only so many frequencies, and only so many people can send/receive at the same time. So if someone wants to watch a video video, and a particular segment is (say) 100M, then if a device…

You'd figure that would incentivize cell operators not to market segment higher speeds behind higher prices. It's like I'm paying them extra for the privilege of increasing their network efficiency.

4G (AIUI) uses different frequencies, is a sunk cost, and 5G needs new gear, so someone has to pay for upgrades and the 5G frequency auctions.

Re: 5G networks meet consumer needs as mobile data growth slows

#175

Post by daedrdev »

sweeter wrote: post #100
daedrdev wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My public utility is bad at its job because it has literally zero incentive to be cheap, and thus my utilities are expensive

A private electric grid is a nightmare. Look at Texas. People pay more, and they get less coverage. It's worse by every metric. The conversation should revolve around, how can we fix the government so that it isn't 5 corporations in a trench coat who systematically defund public utilities and social safety nets in hopes of breaking it so they can privatize it and make billions sucking up tax payer money while doing n…

In Texas electricity is literally less than half the price than the price in my state on average. (14c/kwh vs 34c/kwh) (I live in California)

If you want to say its worse, perhaps you should check if its actually worse first.

Re: 5G networks meet consumer needs as mobile data growth slows

#176

Post by L-four »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #145
hedora wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It actually works well in most places. Look up the term “common carrier”. The trick is that the entity that owns the wires has to provide/upgrade the network at cost, and anyone has the right to run a telco on top of the network. This creates competition for things like pricing plans, and financial incentives for the companies operating in the space to compete on their ability to build out / upgrade the network (or t…

> This creates competition for things like pricing plans If the common carrier is doing all the work, what’s the point of the companies on top? What do they add to the system besides cost? Might as well get rid of them and have a national carrier.

They add value by producing complicated and convoluted contracts which cannot be compared easily full of gotchas.

Re: 5G networks meet consumer needs as mobile data growth slows

#177

Post by recursive »

pr337h4m wrote: post #88

>Regulators may also have to consider whether fewer operators may be better for a country, with perhaps only a single underlying fixed and mobile network in many places—just as utilities for electricity, water, gas, and the like are often structured around single (or a limited set of) operators. There are no words to describe how stupid this is.

How confusing. Now I can't tell whether it's very stupid, not stupid, or medium stupid. Too bad there were no words.

Re: 5G networks meet consumer needs as mobile data growth slows

#178

Post by bityard »

aceazzameen wrote: post #170
viraptor wrote: post #147

> Could maximum data speeds—on mobile devices, at home, at work—be approaching “fast enough” for most people for most purposes? That seems to be the theme across all consumer electronics as well. For an average person mid phones are good enough, bargain bin laptops are good enough, almost any TV you can buy today is good enough. People may of course desire higher quality and specific segments will have higher needs,…

The answer is yes. But it's not just about speed. The higher speeds drain the battery faster. I say this because we currently use an old 2014 phone as a house phone for the family. It's set to 2G to take calls, and switches to 4g for the actual voice call. We only have to charge it once every 2-3 weeks, if not longer. (Old Samsung phones also had Ultra Power Saving mode which helps with that) 2G is being shutdown tho…

I actually miss the concept of house phones. Instead of exclusively person-to-person communication, families would call other families to catch up and sometimes even pass the phone around to talk to the grandparents, aunts and uncles, etc.

Re: 5G networks meet consumer needs as mobile data growth slows

#180

Post by dragonwriter »

daedrdev wrote: post #175
sweeter wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A private electric grid is a nightmare. Look at Texas. People pay more, and they get less coverage. It's worse by every metric. The conversation should revolve around, how can we fix the government so that it isn't 5 corporations in a trench coat who systematically defund public utilities and social safety nets in hopes of breaking it so they can privatize it and make billions sucking up tax payer money while doing n…

In Texas electricity is literally less than half the price than the price in my state on average. (14c/kwh vs 34c/kwh) (I live in California) If you want to say its worse, perhaps you should check if its actually worse first.

A big part of the reason that California average electrical price per kWh is high is that a huge portion of the cost is fixed costs, and California's efficiency push has resulted in the lowest lowest per capita electricity usage (and fourth lowest per capita energy usage) in the USA, so the fixed costs are spread over fewer kWh.

Conversely, Texas has significantly above average use per capita, spreading the fixed costs across more kWh, but still results in higher annual costs per capita, despite lower per kWh rates.

Post reply on HN