India, April 11 -- What would happen if left-side driving cars ran on the same roads as right-side ones? What if trams did not have dedicated tracks? Imagine the chaos if trains dashed around without all those railroads?

Picture a shoe store with all shoe sizes stacked together without any of those 5, 6, or 7 labels? Take a moment of silence if anyone has shopped for any Ikea furniture without those manuals that tell what goes where.

Sounds strange? No. Scary is more like it. Yeah. And that is exactly why standards matter so much. Even if a technology has become too suave, too futuristic, and too cool for all the nuts-and-bolts paperwork, it helps to have some blueprints.

6G is facing that very moment as the world gears up for this big...