作為下一代無線網絡技術的昵稱，5G看起來似乎十分美好。然而，當你看到為了確保實現它能夠提供的各種特性所需布置的大量線纜之后，例如更快的數據交換、更低的延遲、節能和成本節約等，你還會有這種想法嗎？

難道當今的城市還不夠擁擠嗎？在9月于洛杉磯召開的美洲世界移動大會上，我曾問過移動行業貿易集團GSMA的首席營銷官邁克爾·奧哈拉這個問題。

他說：“當數據傳輸達到這種非常高的速度時，傳輸距離就得縮短，因此人們必須在內容獲取地點設置更多的天線和數據中心?；旧厦恳粋€數據燈柱就得安裝一根天線。”

換句話說，數據通道在變寬的同時必須變短。

奧哈拉在談論數據密集型虛擬現實技術時表示：“再看看延遲問題，當你嘗試進行洛杉磯的虛擬現實體驗時，位于亞利桑那州的數據沙漠中心發揮不了什么作用。因此，基礎設施投資是不可或缺的?！保ㄘ敻恢形木W）

譯者：Pessy

審校：夏林

5G, the nickname for the next generation of wireless networks, seems great—until you think about all of the very real wires that will need to be put in place to ensure its promises of faster data exchange, lower latency, energy savings, and cost reductions.

Aren’t today’s cities crowded enough? I asked Michael O’Hara, chief marketing officer for mobile-industry trade group GSMA, in September at the Mobile World Congress Americas convention in Los Angeles.

“When you go to this very high speed, you go to shorter range, so you do have to have more antennas and data centers close to where the content is being consumed,” he says, adding: “You need to have, essentially, an antenna per lamppost.”

In other words, in exchange for making the data “pipe” bigger, you need to make it shorter.

“When you get back to that latency conversation, a datacenter in the Arizona desert doesn’t do you a lot of good when you’re trying to do a VR experience in L.A.” O’Hara says of data-intensive virtual reality technology. “So there’s got to be some infrastructure investment.”