The focus of Nicholas Kristof’s column this week is Change.org, the site that is helping “very ordinary people to defeat some of the most powerful corporate and political interests around.”

“We’re growing more each month than the total we had in the first four years,” Ben Rattray, Change.org’s founder, told Kristof.

Users launch about 10,000 petitions each month on the site.

Change.org has several high-profile accomplishments under its belt. On the health front, Kristof highlights the website’s success involving a network of “clinics” — accused of abusing lesbians (in an effort to “cure” them) — in Ecuador:

A petition denouncing this practice gathered more than 100,000 signatures, leading Ecuador to close the clinics, announce a national advertising campaign against homophobia, and appoint a gay-rights activist as health minister.