JewishTVNetwork.com, an online Jewish video source, will show Yom Kippur services live over the Internet.
The broadcast of Kol Nidre from the Wilshire Boulevard Temple, the oldest Reform synagogue in Los Angeles, will begin Friday at 4:45 p.m. PST.
JewishTVNetwork.com was launched earlier this year by JTN Productions, a non-profit production company that is developing, among other projects, a six-hour documentary for PBS called “The Jewish Americans.” CEO Jay Sanderson told JTA that the Jewish community has been slow to embrace new media opportunities, and he hopes his Internet venture will revolutionize Jewish life in America.
“If the Jewish community really responds to this and sees this opportunity – which honestly the Jewish community is the last community to embrace media in terms of its possibilities – I think that we’re going to be able to deal with a lot of our issues in a different way,” Sanderson said.
JewishTVNetwork.com is attracting several thousand users daily to its library of Jewish content streaming over the Internet. But Sanderson believes the Kol Nidre event, which represents the network’s first foray into live Internet broadcasting, opens up a range of possibilities.
“You don’t have to get on an airplane to go to Israel to be in Israel. You don’t have to walk in to a synagogue to feel spirituality,” Sanderson said. “But once you’ve seen the Kol Nidre service, next year maybe you’ll go to Kol Nidre services.”
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