4G, 3G, 2D, 3D: Why Should I Care?

4G technology is here!  Woo-hoo!  I was excited when Apple released 3G!  But 4-Gs!  Wow.
The cartoon "Dilbert" says 4G stands for "g-g-g-good." Wikipedia says it's " referring to the fourth generation of cellular wireless standards" and "is the successor to 3G and 2G."  Huh?? If you're still not sure what that means and you really think that 4G technology somehow is a successor to 3D or 2D, raise your hand.

Basically, in real layman's terms, the "G" standard refers to "D-igital." So, it should be "4D" but that was taken by the movie and entertainment business.  I guess since the "D" was not available, some brainiac came up with a "G" since it's the closest letter to "D" and because "E" and "F" just didn't seem appropriate. G and D really have nothing to do with each other. Those in the telecommunications industries know that the 4G system is supposed to provide super-duper, comprehensive and secure Internet-based solutions to connect phones and wireless device users to really cool services:  gaming, multimedia streaming, IP telephone connections and much faster service than we can even comprehend now.

We used to just pick up a phone, dial and get connected to the person we needed to speak to on the other end. We didn't need to know the technology behind MaBell. In fact, we didn't care about the technology behind MaBell, unless of course you worked there or aspired to from your lab at MIT or CalTech.  Phones just worked. Not so anymore. In order to get the best deal, we need to understand the footprint, the device's capabilities, just how many apps it supports, Now, we have so many choices, that we have all become de facto engineers, salesmen, phone repair guys and geeks.

Why should we care?  Because we all still want to get the best deal, don't we? We don't want to be left out. Maybe 4 G is THAT g-g-g-good. Maybe we'll have to wait for 5Gs to be really wowed.





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