If the FCC is going to kill net neutrality, it'll have to get through you and me first | Dan Gillmor

Believers in an open internet just delayed a seemingly inevitable takeover from Big Telecom and its allies. Can we win the war?

• Plus: FCC extends deadline for comments on net neutrality

If you, like me, are one of the hundreds of thousands of Americans who has recently asked the Federal Communications Commission to support an open internet, congratulations: you may actually have made a difference. So many people posted pre-deadline responses on Tuesday about how the regulator will oversee the future of the internet that its public-comment filing page nearly crashed, prompting an extension until this Friday night.

The outpouring to support what's generally called "network neutrality" has taken the form of letters and official filings to the FCC website, as well as more public campaigns in recent months. It's been gratifying to watch, but don't get your hopes up: the FCC chairman, former cable and wireless industry lobbyist Tom Wheeler, floated the idea of internet "fast lanes" earlier this year – and he'll probably to turn the web into a somewhat enhanced form of cable TV anyway.