The dawn of 4G -- it's the total experience not just the network

The industry has been talking lately about what 4G really means, including T-Mobile (see: Inside T-Mobile’ notion of 4G). T-Mobile's senior director in Engineering and Operations shares his thoughts in this column.

New technology takes time to mature, and become useful, trustworthy and reliable. When it comes to wireless innovation, networks and devices must evolve together to deliver truly breakthrough experiences. For the past several years, device innovation has been outpacing network innovation. But, with the emergence of 4G networks that’s changing. We’re finally unlocking the true potential of mobile computing, and we’ve come a long way.

I think back to the early part of the last decade when 3G networks emerged promising improved speeds and Web access. But, those improvements hardly changed consumers’ Web-access experience on their devices. There was little material difference between 100kbps and 384kbps when the screen on your device accommodated only a few lines of text and took three seconds to render it to a monochrome display.

In 2000, MobileStar, a nascent wireless Internet service provider, had recognized the value of mobile Web access and had started a venue based build-out of WiFi. Just a few years later, 2003, the pre-cursor to the modern netbook, HP’s flash storage Omnibook 300 had been around for ten years as had Apple’s Newton MessagePad, the original iPad. Few people in 2003, myself included, thought that these types of devices would benefit from connection to the growing mobile Web. In retrospect, we may well regard these innovators as being ahead of their time. Yet, on reflection, their history tells more about what was missing than what they achieved. Think of it as a technological equivalent to the missing link in the fossil record. The Omnibook 300 was replaced with bulkier hard-disk enabled laptops with limited battery life, and the Newton succumbed to natural selection, in part because there was no easy way to get things on or off the device. The ephemeral MobileStar was overcome by shifting economic sands that we now know as the dot-com bust. As Neo heard from Morpheous in the movie “The Matrix,” “Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of irony.”

From then on, and really through 2007, wireless service providers introduced new access technologies, each offering marginal performance improvements. In this decade, we saw everything from WAP, compact HTML and low-resolution screens. The biggest push from the wireless industry during this period of time was making devices slimmer and more fashionable. The early 2000’s were for the mobile Web what the 80’s was for music: a mish-mash of theatrical stuff afflicted by obvious omissions. Sorry 80’s music fans, but you know I’m telling the truth here. There was still a missing link. The 3G mobile Web was very much less than the sum of the parts. Although the components required to make the mobile Web shine in the hands of consumers were evolving, no one had yet assembled them into a well- integrated and compelling experience.

Today, things are very different; we have the robust networks, superior devices with incredible performance, applications that are optimized for mobile use and services that define a completely different mobile Web experience.
Only just the other day, I arrived at my office a few minutes late needing to find my next meeting quickly. I looked at my bag with my laptop inside, considered how long it was going to take to get connected, turned to my T-Mobile myTouch 4G smartphone and quickly pulled up my work calendar to find my destination. It took less than three single-handed seconds to solve my question. On my way to the meeting, I was able to pull up the attached multimegabyte presentation and mentally prepare for the discussion. All this from the palm of my hand, in a matter of seconds.

Experiences like these are not just equivalent to the desktop Web, they are in many ways better. The connection speed, utility, on-the go mobility and universal access extend beyond my desk and office to a multitude of cities and countries around the world. I now have almost instant access to my social networks, music, and, best of all, my friends and family — all with the full richness of the desktop Web. This is not the mobile Web of old — not the “mobilized Web” — it is a totally new and different mobile experience.
What I enjoy today on my T-Mobile myTouch 4G is light years different from the mobile Web experience of the recent past. There is a sense of integrity in the user interface that is compelling — it’s not just the screen itself, but rather a calculus that includes five operator-integrated components: nearly light-speed cell site back-haul, a modern Internet Protocol-enabled core network, ample radio spectrum, and an efficient and modern radio technology in HSPA+. Sum that to the new class of brawny Android-powered smart phones, ample battery power and a blazing fast data connection and what you have is a well-integrated, fully backward-compatible service that enables a vastly different end-user experience from anything that has come before.

The missing link may have been solved — it’s more than just one thing, a radio technology or network or device. The missing link is the sum of all these things in the right proportions, thoroughly optimized and completely backward compatible. 4G is more about the user experiences and not a technology, the order of magnitude improvement compared to what went before and, importantly, it’s about enabling a completely new set of devices and services that are equivalent and better than the desktop Web.

I’ve got my 4G experience, do you have yours?

--

This article expresses the opinions of Mark McDiarmid, Sr. Director in Engineering and Operations at T-Mobile, and not necessarily those of T-Mobile USA, Inc.