For Net Neutrality Advocates, a Moment to Celebrate

Online activists played a significant role in the vote to regulate broadband Internet service as a utility. And even before the vote, outside the headquarters of the Federal Communications Commission, they started taking a bow.

Grassroots advocacy groups began gathering outside the building more than four hours before the 1 p.m. vote, greeting each other with preemptive congratulations while staking silhouettes of black cats into the ground as a playful nod to Internet cat memes. The cats wore orange stickers that read “Save the Internet.” “We have been out here pretty much every month — in rain, sleet and now snow,” said Craig Aaron, president and chief executive of Free Press.