ACCORDING TO MOST AUTHORITIES, parts of selihot must be omitted when said sans a minyan.
* All the Aramaic is skipped.
* Each kaddish is skipped.
* Each of the 13 attributes of HaShem (ויעבר) are skipped.
Each of the above requires a minyan.
THANKS TO THE INTERNET, there may be a way to have a “virtual” minyan.
R. Laredo makes it clear that this applies ONLY to selihot. It does not apply to any other service.
The virtual minyan must be in real time; more than a few seconds latency – delay in transmitting sound from Point A to Point B – and the virtual minyan is not a minyan.
However, he cited several popular applications that meet the “real time” requirement; included are WhatsApp, Facetime, and similar. Perhaps Google’s Hangouts and Microsoft’s Skype also qualify providing there is a fast internet service provider (ISP).
OK – R. Laredo stopped here.
I got to thinking.
If I am too lazy to drag myself out of bed in time for a 6 a.m. (or earlier) selihot minyan, maybe I could “sleep in” and catch a minyan in the Central time zone.
That’s cheating since (Sefardi) selihot’s opening words are “קמתי באשמורת“ – roughly “I got up during the night watch” which of course a Central time zone minyan belies that statement.
According to My Zmanim (https://www.myzmanim.com), I’m “good” as long as I can complete reciting the שמע on or before 9:32 a.m. (That’s the last time for the shema according to Gra & Baal HaTanya for Hollywood FL on August 14, 2018. Times change daily.) Of course, praying sans a minyan means no kaddish and no repetition of the Ahmedah, but late risers might find a late starting minyan that still will “beat the shema clock.” (There are a couple of minyans that start at 8 a.m.; neither congregation is Sefardi or Mizrachi, so selihot during Elul are not an issue.)
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