The type of property is not immaterial. A very straightforward bit of intellectual wankery gets you to that point: you own Bingo Card Creator; there is a national Bingo emergency; eminent domain is employed; the US Government pays you $15MM USD. Patrick's a principled guy but I say this as one of his friends that principle is for sale for $15MM.

So now we're just haggling over the price.

Given that we are, it is inherently less fair for seize something for a which a real market value can't be determined.

When you evoke seizure of a software company, you're evoking the image in your mind of a government attempting to value your company. But the market famously doesn't know how to value small businesses. You know you're not getting anything resembling what it's worth.

When you seize a piece of commercial real estate in Manhattan, you can tell me all you want about how shady the NYC CRE market is, but there is a relatively liquid market for NYC CRE. It is less unfair to seize commercial real estate, corporate bonds, t-bills, or proven mineral deposits than it is to seize a business.

But. And please read this next sentence carefully. I agree with you about Columbia. I think this is an abuse of eminent domain.

(Why - oh - why is Thomas talking about this then? Because it's so - f'ing - much - more - interesting than yet another long rant about how the government is evil and I'm ashamed of my country and the weather in December is awful and God really needs to get on top of fixing that).

?? The current discussion is about the abuse of eminent domain, not about the type of property which fall under eminent domain. IMHO, you are not adding much to discussion by bringing up NYC CRE.