The purpose is two-fold: Getting customers to engage with public officials in favor of 5G, and spotting groundswells of interest as an indicator of demand.

• Translated: Verizon is leveraging its customers for local lobbying — although Verizon says it's fully transparent that it's behind the effort — while also mapping out its footprint.
• "We want to build networks and services on those networks, and to do that we need constituents who want those services," a Verizon spokesperson tells Axios.

Why it matters: A major hurdle for telecom companies wanting to roll out 5G is getting each municipal government to approve all the permitting requests to install hundreds of thousands of small-cell antennas all over town.

• The FCC has imposed a uniform process on cities to speed up approvals. Still, there's some resistance from cities worried about aesthetics, cost and equitable coverage.

Verizon is also taking a page out of the playbook used by tech companies when expanding to new areas.

• For example, Google and Amazon asked cities to pitch them on bringing high-speed fiber internet service and HQ2, respectively, to their areas.
• Yes, but: Google Fiber was selling the promise of fast fiber, which at the time (2011) was rare and enticing. Amazon HQ was selling jobs, jobs, jobs. Verizon, on the other hand, is selling a technology whose applications don't yet exist.

Our thought bubble: Motivating the masses to shout loudly that they want 5G faster could be tough. Despite the industry hype around 5G, many consumers still have no idea what it is or why they should care. For many, their current 4G LTE service allows them to stream movies and browse the web just fine.

Go deeper: Trump team considers nationalizing 5G network

How it works: There's a trade show exemption that allows companies to discuss or announce products even if they haven’t been formally approved by the FCC. But they can’t be marketed or sold without that authorization. RF devices needing FCC approval include cellphones as well as Internet of Things devices such as smart appliances or "smart home" gadgets.

What's happening: As an independent agency with alternative funding mechanisms, the FCC stayed open longer than many other agencies. It suspended operations a week ago, on Jan. 3.

• However, the agency said a small staff will continue work related to "the protection of life and property" — which could include things like 911 outages or weather-related communications disruptions.
• Up to 200 employees are continuing work on spectrum auctions, which is funded by auction proceeds.
• All told, about 17% of the FCC's workers have been retained for various essential purposes without pay or are being paid via funding other than the lapsed appropriations.

What isn't happening: In addition to product authorizations, other suspended activities include work on consumer complaints, enforcement actions and licensing proceedings. The FCC also reviews major deals — like the pending merger of Sprint and T-Mobile — and those reviews have also stopped.

"It does stifle business opportunity and strategy," said Marc Martin, chairman of the communications practice at law firm Perkins Coie, who noted that some of his clients are annoyed by the shutdown disruption to business plans: "Companies rely on government timelines for things to get resolved."