M.I.A. tips her hat to 5G conspiracy theories with her quirky new streetwear brand, Ohmni.
Taking to Instagram, the “Paper Planes” musician unveiled the collection, complete with a “Tin Foil Hat,” boasting “100 percent brain coverage” priced at $100; a “Data Protection Dump Bag,” priced at $200 and allegedly blocking “99.99 percent” of “electromagnetic radiation”; and a $200 “Full Protection Poncho,” offering “full coverage of brain, gut, lungs, heart, and womb.”
Discussing the inspiration behind the launch, the British artist. playfully tackled the conspiracy theories her brand addresses.
“This is just giving you a choice. If you want your heartbeat measured every time you go down the high street in a smart city, you don’t have to wear Ohmni,” she began. “But if you don’t want that – today you want to own your own data, and your own biometrics and your own stuff. Then, you can just put on Ohmni and it kinda holds it off for a bit.”
Later in the clip, M.I.A. showcased her mesh metal durag, which she claims empowers wearers to “choose when your neurolink is operational.”
Regarding M.I.A.’s comment on smart cities: Upon its inception, 5G was marketed as providing faster data speeds and greater network capacity than existing 4G LTE technology. It is expected to enable innovations such as smart cities and robotic surgeries.
As for why a small subset of people are concerned about the service, 5G is a set of technical specifications enabling wireless devices to communicate with cell networks using a broader range of radio frequency waves than 3G and 4G, enhancing speed and bandwidth.
There are three types of 5G networks: low-band, which offers wide coverage with moderate speed improvements; mid-band, which balances speed and coverage; and high-band, which provides superfast speeds but limited range. Low- and mid-band networks are expected to cover most of the country, while high-band networks will be concentrated in cities due to the need for numerous small cell sites to maintain signal strength. The concern stems from worries about the potential health effects of the radio frequencies used for signal transmission.