Do we really need 6G?
5G scaled traffic, not returns. Does 6G address the real constraints of telecom networks?
After one of my last posts, I was pretty shocked about something. The growing skepticism around 6G is not about radio theory or spectrum scarcity; it is a reaction to the 5G experience, in which traffic scaled, costs increased, and returns failed to keep pace. That frustration is valid, but it also leads to a false conclusion.
The question is not whether 6G brings obvious new services or killer apps. The question is whether the current system can efficiently absorb the next shift in traffic patterns, device behavior, and coordination requirements. When networks move from episodic human sessions to continuous machine-driven interaction, the limiting factors change. Control overhead, latency variance, energy per useful bit, and coordination complexity become the dominant constraints.
6G emerges at that boundary, not as a speed upgrade, but as a response to system-level limits that 5G cannot remove without an architectural change.