He was in charge of web operations at the Jewish Journal but he lost his job last week.
He was my friend and my guide in love, life and Torah.
Oh well, I guess I’m back to leaning on Amalek.
Is this the Journal’s craiglist ad for a Dennis replacement?
Rob Eshman emails: "Luke: Nope, that’s not our ad. It reads: "Requirements: Knowledge about Judaism and the Jewish community" As any number of our critics would tell you, one mustn’t know ANYTHING about Judaism or the Jewish community in order to qualify for a job here."
Chaim Amalek emails: "What do you suppose was the turning point, the place where you began withdrawing from the endless demands of Jewish orthodoxy? This might be a good topic for a book: "There and Back Again: Luke Ford Interviews Baalei Teshuva and Converts Who Rethought Their Relationship With Judaism""
Dennis Wilen came to my hovel in August 2007 to make this video:
I choose to remember Dennis in happier days, when he was standing on the beach on the Saturday night after Obama’s victory participating in LimmudLA’s healing havdala and he was surrounded by Orit Arfa and Danielle Berrin. That’s the way to go out in style!
Dennis posts on Facebook:
Dear Friends —
In case you missed a somewhat low-key message I posted around the Internets earlier this week, here’s an update on what’s going on with me.
JewishJournal.com laid me off on Friday, in the middle of my third year as Web Director.
Financial issues (it’s the economy, stupid!) were behind the layoff, and I am assured of good references for my work.
Indeed, I revived a dead site, increased traffic over 500% and moved JewishJournal.com into the modern world with blogs, audio and video, an actual CMS and 24/7 updates.
As a result, we won our first awards for online journalism from the L.A. Press Club, made our own headlines in the media (my naming of "Swindler’s List," the all-Madoff group blog, got me into ‘Variety’) and created an internationally-recognized
If you know of any executive positions for an internet strategist/web producer/web editor, please let me know.
Recommendations on LinkedIn.com would be cool as well.
