Verizon gave us a nudge today to note that the first hurdle in their mega-deal with Frontier has been jumped -- namely Frontier received shareholder approval. The $8.5 billion deal would infuse Frontier (which currently has 2.3 million customers) with 4.8 million new residential and small-business phone lines across 14 states, 1 million broadband connections, and 11,000 former Verizon employees. That huge sudden growth in subscribers and debt is what killed the last two major Verizon efforts to offload their rural subscribers in Hawaii and New England, meaning regulators will be under serious pressure not to rubber stamp the deal.