JGooders, a ground-breaking online initiative launched to great fanfare at the 2008 GA, has announced it is formally closing down next week.

As we wrote back in May, JGooders, while continuing to receive and process donations, was undergoing a reorganization. Unfortunately for the philanthropic community, that reorganization is now leading to closure.

When launched, JGooders founder Ronit Dolev told us,

JGooders is yet another attempt to make a quantum leap: to provide added meaning by developing a global network of Jews and Israelis involved in the third sector (the not for profit organizations). This is where we all meet to do good, to give back to our communities, to introduce change, to improve lives, to care for each other, to strengthen the weaker parts of our society, our people, to ensure continuity, to invest in the younger generation, to make an impact on our lives, our children’s lives, the future.

Sounds ambitious? Well … it is. But I have always been told that one need to think big to make change happen. So we are gathering the best (we still do) and we put our faith in you: in your wisdom to take advantage of this bold idea, bring the platform to life, make it serve your needs and enable you to do good.

The broader world of online giving continues to grow. As others consider JGooders closing, and their own online fundraising plans, the question that must be asked is – and to which we believe is still unanswered – can the Jewish world sustain a proprietary, independent, online giving platform? We’ll all need to wait and see.