I wish this was an Aprils fools joke, but far from springing the news on short notice Mind had the good grace and foresight to warn us all months ago that this day would come: From today, Mind has stepped down as Executive Director of the Immortality Institute. His contract expires and he chose not to renew it at this stage. I won’t attempt to speak on his behalf, but I can speak on behalf of the board in saying that we are extremely sorry to see Mind go. In truth, we don’t know how we will cope without him.
ImmInst is a community – that is its heart and DNA and it only works, every day because many people contribute to it. Funny though, how sometimes personalities stand out to steer the motley caravan, to herd the crazy cats. In the history of ImmInnst there are two people who stand head and shoulders above all others: Bruce who started it all and now Mind, who stepped up to keep the ship afloat after it lay cast adrift and rudderless. His accomplishments during the last three years were many – others may want to enumerate, but I fear that this attempt would detract from the most important contribution that he made: he was there. He was there when the going got rough, when spammers and trolls had him in their crosshairs, when irritable members or sponsors wanted a solution to their problems – or life – by yesterday afternoon, when callous calibans were breathing down his neck about tasks and targets. He was there when most of us are not: he was there when he didn’t feel like it. He was there as the MIND of ImmInst.org.
And now he won’t be.
But all is not bleak. Mind assures us that he will be in touch, that he will help out and give advice where he can. That is the greatest relief because things may well fall apart if it were otherwise. Sneakily, we hope that via that route, we will manage to lure him back in, in the long run, after he had a rest and a breather and time to relax and recuperate. We hope that Minds entrepreneurial spirit and his generosity will conspire to bring him back into the very heart of the grass roots organisation that – thanks to him – punches so effectively above its weight. That plan will only succeed however, if we are all very nice to him for a change.
So ladies and gentlemen, please be upstanding and give it up for ImmInst' past and future steward: Justin, the Mind, Loew.