An online petition in 2003 pushed the Human Rights Campaign into the world of online fund- and friendraising. And the organization never looked back.

By Margaret Battistelli Gardner

HRC, the country’s largest nonprofit that advocates the civil rights of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans, was ready with an e-mail that would drop as soon as the press conference ended. When it did, the impact was immediate and astounding: 400,000 responses that brought in $600,000 overnight to fight the president’s proposal.