One of my favorite tech blogs...

engadget is testing out a new trackback feature. I've always wanted to get that working, so here goes nothing.

If you're half as nerdy as I am, it's worth reading every day (and if you're as nerdy as I am, you'll need to check it about 100 times a day).

We Shall Keep the Faith

by Moina Michael, November 1918, inspired by John McCrae's 1915 In Flanders Fields

Oh! you who sleep in Flanders Fields,
Sleep sweet - to rise anew!
We caught the torch you threw
And holding high, we keep the Faith
With All who died.

We cherish, too, the poppy red
That grows on fields where valor led;
It seems to signal to the skies
That blood of heroes never dies,
But lends a lustre to the red
Of the flower that blooms above the dead
In Flanders Fields.

And now the Torch and Poppy Red
We wear in honor of our dead.
Fear not that ye have died for naught;
We'll teach the lesson that ye wrought
In Flanders Fields.

AOL is dead, long live AOL

I have actually been a member of America Online since the early 90's. Despite having gotten a cable modem, outside email services and having no real need for AOL for close to 5 years now, I've stayed with them. Why? Because of the people. AOL's content was people. In its numerous online communicates folks gathered to help eachother out with problems, answer questions and to provide support. It was a very human experience, a neighborhood system for the internet. There could be 25 million users on AOL, but you could know actually know the couple of hundred around you in your little community.

Since the service began, these little areas were lead by "hosts" and "leaders" who orchestrated the chats and helped to answer questions. Despite what most people thought, these people were not employed by AOL... they were volunteers. Folks, like myself, who would devote a couple of hours a week to answer questions. What did these volunteers ask for in return? Nothing but a conduit for helping people.

For reasons I'll probably never understand, AOL no longer feels that it needs these unpaid volunteers. As of June 8th, the "community leader" program will be discontinued and with it, all that's left of AOL's communities. I'll no longer be answering questions about iMacs and printers and system panics on Sunday nights and I'll no longer get to help people with the cell phones and Palm Pilots on Mondays.

I'll miss AOL because I'll miss the people. I'll miss helping people and the people who helped me out when I had questions. I'll miss the gratitude of the person who we helped get their printer to print, or the lady who knows how to use her iPod now.

I won't be keeping AOL, because without the people, without the communities... there is no AOL. All that's left now is a bunch of outdated, proprietary software. Give me Safari or Firefox, AIM or iChat over AOL's junk any day. Why pay for A when B, C and D are MUCH better and free?

That is some mouth you've got, gift horse...

A picture camera is worth a thousand words $450

My math might be a little off... but MacWorld has just released a review of my current favorite camera, the Canon SD500. I had previously blogged about it, before buying one for my Mom a few weeks back. I'm also pleased to report that C-net has updated/retracted its only so-so review of the camera's quality, after learning it received a defective unit (thanks to the anonymous commenter who pointed that out). Our experience with the phone has been extremely positive... and words cannot describe how small and fast this camera really is.

Update: Looks like the street price of this camera has actually increased since I got ours.

A great read

Tris McCall has posted his interview of Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah T. Healy.

Read on...

(As a side note, at one point in the interview Mayor Healy mentions an abatement lawsuit - if it's the one I'm thinking of, Hoboken and Jersey City were named defendants... but I can't for the life of me remember anything else about it...)

Stairway to... uh... heaven

Grove Street Station
Originally uploaded by pdcryan.

I had blogged awhile back about the new entrance to the Grove Street PATH station... but didn't actually climb the steps until today.

Emphasis on the word steps. The Port Authority missed the obvious opportunity to make the last inaccessible station in Jersey City ADA compliant. Maybe the PA thinks folks with mobility devices can just huff it from Exchange Place... easily traversing our beautifully paved streets and completely unobstructed sidewalks...

City Hall

City Hall
Originally uploaded by pdcryan.

Blogger seems to be down... maybe I can post from Flickr (if you are seeing this... the answer is yes).

Update: Things look back to normal again - of course now that things are working, I don't really have anything to post.

Now that I've seemingly posted a photo for no reason, let me remind everyone to tag their Jersey City photos on Flickr! (here are the photos tagged "Jersey City" and a Jersey City group - anybody know these folks?)

No Stopping or Standing

No Stopping or Standing
Originally uploaded by pdcryan.

It's been fun, but Mary and I graduate on Friday. Unfortunately, we don't really have time to stop and smell the roses because we've already been taking bar exam review courses for a week...

Despite the fact that our school is in downtown Newark, and downtown Newark has MANY wonderful large venues (see NJPAC, Symphony Hall, Riverfront Stadium)... our commencement is at the PNC Arts Center in Holmdel. If you ask me (nobody does, BTW), it's just plain stupid... and borderline insulting to our State's (soon to be second) largest city.

New gadget time

First, I'd like to thank the Enlighten NJ blog for the shout out. It's nice to see people are reading (or at least notice).

Second - Verizon wireless is supposed to launch the PalmOne Treo 650 to their consumer customers today... I haven't seen it in the website yet... but as soon as it does, it's new phone time (finally!).

The Secret Subsidy

You might remember my previous post about tax-abatements. Well, the shit might hit the fan sooner than I thought. The Jersey Journal is reporting that Hoboken, Jersey City and Harrison are on the Abbott hit list... as in getting hit off the list. Apparently, the unthinkable might soon happen... enough improvement in our public schools to loose state support.

I've never had a problem with tax abatements and PILOTS, per se. I like to see the redevelopment of our cities. Dense growth in established urban areas where we already have investments in infrastructure is a good thing, with big benefits to society - it should be encouraged and tax abatements are a good way to do that.

As I've said before - there's a unique problem when using abatements to encourage development in areas (like Jersey City and Hoboken) where the state pays a good portion of the public education tab. The temptation is there to short change the school district's share of property taxes because the courts require the state to make up the difference. Right now, it looks to me like that's exactly what Jersey City is doing. In exchange for an abatement, the City requires developers to make PILOT payments to the City and the County. The City gets a little more up front... the county a less than it normally would, the developer gets an incentive to build and the schools get next to nothing. And who's left holding the bag for the schools? The state - which means state income tax payers.

This creates two major problems.

The first is a philosophical problem. There's a shell game being orchestrated by the city. Normally, the policy choice would be property tax money for development, or property tax money for education. Guns or butter. Normally, if a city wanted to give incentives for development in the form of tax breaks, it would be at the expense of education or other services. There's a finite amount of property tax revenue to go around. But not so in the Abbott cities - State-wide income tax revenue supports our school system to make up for the shortfall. Therein is the secret subsidy for development. People of all incomes across New Jersey are paying income tax - including some low income and a lot of middle income New Jersey citizens. And who is benefitting from it? In Hoboken and Jersey City, when you train your eyes upwards, you see gleaming glass towers: corporate office buildings and high ticket apartments/condos. While people might be OK with statewide income tax money from middle class families paying for educating students - the same people just might have a problem subsidizing the kind of abated construction that's going on and to an extent, that's where the money is really going.

The second problem is, what happens when our schools turn around? Sure, the City's balance sheet might add up with the state paying the bill for the public schools - but what will happen when they pull out? Who will pay for the schools between the time that Abbott skips town and the abatements expire? It looks to me that there sure are a lot of properties that have locked in long term deals that involve paying no money at all to the public schools. When the main source of public school funding becomes property taxes again, where will the money come from?

Trenton, we have a problem...

Waiting in line

Waiting in line
Originally uploaded by pdcryan.

If you're ever in the Trenton area, you need to stop by the Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton. It's VERY close to the Hamilton station on NJ Transit's NEC line - but not quite close enough to walk.

If you're up for an amazing meal there's also a great restaurant on the grounds: Rat's. (For those of you on a budget, I'd suggest packing a sandwich or visiting one of the other more low-key eateries - Rat's is quite expensive)

A new path to the PATH

Grove Street Construction - March 2005
Originally uploaded by pdcryan.

The 2nd egress at the Grove Street PATH station opened (see Port Authority page; Jersey Journal article). Now, I'm stuck in Newark right now taking a bar review course - so I haven't checked it out yet - but can somebody tell me if it is ADA accessible (read: has an elevator)?

If it doesn't... (and NONE of the articles about it that I've read mention one) I'm once again floored at the shortcitedness of the Port Authority.

(see also not extending PATH directly to Newark Airport instead of the annoying monorail transfer; not moving their old "crap" out of the PowerHouse so it can be redeveloped by its half-owner, Jersey City)

Interesting quote

Today's Jersey Journal quotes one of newly elected Ward E Councilman Steve Fulop's campaign workers Thomas Bertoli:

"You don't bring Dr. Phil to a knifefight," Bertoli said. "Let's just say it's in the Hudson County tradition."

That makes you feel all work and fuzzy inside, doesn't it? I wonder what other "Hudson County traditions" will be embraced downtown...

Update: Looks like that quote caught the eye of the folks at Politics NJ as well.

6 hours from now...

6 hours from now...
Originally uploaded by pdcryan.

In about 6 hours I'll be done with law school. Wish me luck on my last exam...

(FWIW looking at the photos tagged with 'law school' on Flickr makes it look there was a lot less reading than there really was!)

More Adobe & Antitrust

Here's an article on the Adobe & Macromedia merger/buyout. I had previously speculated that Adobe would have to divest itself of one of the two web publishing programs and one of the vector drawing programs - and it looks like that will be the case.

I was surprised that they'll be letting GoLive go (instead of dreamweaver), but I suppose it makes sense to go with the product with more marketshare. Also of note is how they are considering PhotoShop and Fireworks to be in the same market (Fireworks being the product to get the heave-ho)... but it's been a long time since I've used FireWorks, so maybe it's changed into something that's no longer completely unlike photoshop (I thought it was closer to ImageReady or the old ImageStyler).

In Xanado did Kubla Khan...

In Xanado did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree :
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.

Okay... maybe not - but the new "Xanadu" in the meadowlands is under construction and back in the news. The latest twist is a proposed extension of the HiBLeR to the project (in addition to the DMU link from Hoboken terminal through Secaucus Junction along the Pascack Valley Line). NJARP government process agent (lobbyist) and former Assemblywoman Rose Heck has some nice quotes in the article (you might remember her from her Senate bid against Joe Coniglio, who ran a series of radio attack ads against her impersonating Arnold Schwarzenegger).

I'm always all in favor of more mass transportation - but let's build what we've already got planned - or better yet, have the developers pay for it.

Two quick notes

First, today's Jersey Journal has a story on the ground breaking for a new residential tower right next to the Grove street PATH (I had previously blogged about this building in March). I had heard that part of the "deal" would be to improve the "park" by the PATH entrance - I'm glad to see the paper confirm that indeed it is the case.

Second, those of you who like to take pictures of things (like myself) might be interested in reading this letter from NJ's Attorney General to the ACLU, clarifying the state's position on taking pictures of NJ Transit facilities, equipment and stations (like the HiBLeR, for instance). Despite what you may have heard, NJT has no authority to restrict pictures taken from public streets - only those taken from its property, so snap away. You can also request a permit to take shots in stations, etc - but have to agree not to use the photos commercially. The AG cites the need for restrictions based on anti-terrorism concerns - which makes sense to me - but also based on Transit's need to police and maintain control of its intellectual property (logos and trade dress, presumably). The commercial use restriction sounds a lot less like use of police power and a lot more like a taking...

Looking for Seinfeld quotes?

If you're looking for seinfeld quotes (say, to sprinkle into a law school take home exam), you need to visit www.seinfeldscripts.com. It looks like it has a transcript of every episode. Good stuff.