While Apple reportedly plans to sit out the first 5G wave, Samsung clearly wants to get in on the ground floor of this radical new cellular technology, collaborating with everyone from Qualcomm to Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint to get a leg up on the competition.

Meanwhile, the “big four” US carriers are engaged in a fierce battle of their own, each looking to claim as many firsts and breakthroughs as possible. Unfortunately, these are all still largely theoretical achievements that don’t really mean anything for actual consumers... yet.

For instance, it was only a couple of ...