The Beginning of ilovetorah & Frumdate
The start of ilovetorah was done on geocities free server space about 12 years ago. It was created on a 386sx computer using a home Internet connection through the library. All Internet graphics were disabled so the sites were entirely in text. Within the first week, I had created the singles site as well, called A Frum Shidduch Database. It was the second frum singles site ever created after shemayisrael’s shadchan database. In its first year, we made about a dozen matches and had the record for religious singles matches ever on the Internet. In order to improve the websites, I used to go to friends houses that had graphics and 486 power. I was amazed at their fast 56k modem speeds. A year later, I purchased my first real PC, “The Acer from Gehenah”. The worst computer ever made had fallen into my hands. I used to power it up by turning it upside down and it would remain sideways during work. I had a green, non-color 10inch monitor for a while to go along with it until I purchased my NEC color screen. It took 10 returns to NEC headquarters before this new color monitor would run without problems. It then lasted until this year when someone finally donated a new monitor.
In the old days, much of my kiruv work came from chat rooms. I used to go in, so too speak and then make friends. I had a personal goal of helping at least 10 people a day and talking to 50 about Yiddishkite. Until this goal was reached, I wouldn’t go to sleep at night.
There are dozens of divrey Torah from these early times of ilovetorah that are in archives. I hope to bring them all back to life slowly. The main thing are these old videos that I did but I am honestly embarrassed by them. I mean, they were taken 10 years ago when video technology was just starting. I don’t think anyone would argue that I was the first person to ever do video shirim on the web and self-publish them. Every time I go to these new websites and blogs, I wonder if one day, I will simply be an archive of the first timers. I remember back then thinking to myself, I must make sure the quality of videos will be good enough 10 years from now when computer power is stronger. The thing is, I simply don’t remember what I did with those higher quality videos. I distinctly remember that I thought ahead on this but I can’t remember where I saved them or how. I mean, I have the video files themselves but did I film them in a higher quality and save them on some disk?
As we move forward to another year of ilovetorah, I want to also look back and bring some of the light of the past. Some old videos can be found here, http://torahvideo.com/jewish-torah  , you need realplayer to view them. For some reason, I still don’t seem to be able to convert them properly to today’s windows media technology. I must warn you though, it is pretty embarrassing to know people are looking at me from 10years ago. Â