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Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)

vinepair.com

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Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)

#21

Post by lisper »

jameslk wrote: post #18

I'm very curious how this tasted and I wonder why there isn't anyone selling them anymore (based on a quick Google search). If it tasted half decent I'm curious if there could still be a market for something like this, given it seems to be able to be stored dry?

There used to be a retail store that let you use their facilities to make your own wine from concentrate packaged in plastic bags. We tried it once. The result was surprisingly good. Unfortunately the place only lasted a year or two before it went under.

Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)

#22

Post by mmmpop »

bruce511 wrote: post #13

One cool thing about the pandemic is that many countries took the opportunity to run large-scale social experiments under the guise of Covid Restrictions. I expect social scientists will be digging into this data for years to come. One experiment in South Africa was banning the sale, or transportation, of alcohol. (Production and consumption was still allowed, just not sale or transportation.) This resulted in a mark…

"Interesting" perhaps... but our definitions of "cool" vary widely.

Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)

#23

Post by mmmpop »

at_compile_time wrote: post #16
gwbas1c wrote: post #2

Reminds me of when a friend ordered some San Pedro cactus over the internet "for religious sacrament." It included a note indicating that they ran out of the exact variety that he ordered, but they thought that he'd be very happy with the one they sent because it was stronger when used for religious purposes. (San Pedro cactus contains mescaline. It's perfectly legal to grow for ornamental purposes.)

Mushroom spores are sold online for "microscopy purposes only".

They don't contain the active ingredient that is specifically illegal, which is what I always heard made the "loophole" possible. Would be interested to know if that's true (but too lazy to alt-tab and search myself.)

Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)

#25

Post by vmception »

bruce511 wrote: post #13

One cool thing about the pandemic is that many countries took the opportunity to run large-scale social experiments under the guise of Covid Restrictions. I expect social scientists will be digging into this data for years to come. One experiment in South Africa was banning the sale, or transportation, of alcohol. (Production and consumption was still allowed, just not sale or transportation.) This resulted in a mark…

> This resulted in a marked decrease in hospital admissions, traffic accidents and domestic crimes.

That was the same worldwide because nobody was outside.

Holy retcon, Batman!

Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)

#26

Post by bruce511 »

mmmpop wrote: post #22
bruce511 wrote: post #13

One cool thing about the pandemic is that many countries took the opportunity to run large-scale social experiments under the guise of Covid Restrictions. I expect social scientists will be digging into this data for years to come. One experiment in South Africa was banning the sale, or transportation, of alcohol. (Production and consumption was still allowed, just not sale or transportation.) This resulted in a mark…

"Interesting" perhaps... but our definitions of "cool" vary widely.

Cool because data is always cool :)

More seriously,because it would simply be impossible to run these social experiments in normal circumstances.

There are other examples; New Zealand and Australia tested a "closed border" approach, Sweden adopted a "personal responsibility" approach. Some places had curfews. The shere variety and scale of the last two years have generated enormous amounts of data, and matching data to long-term consequences will keep anthropologists busy for years.

And just might inform better choices when the next one happens.

Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)

#27

Post by twirlock »

db65edfc7996 wrote: post #17
TylerE wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a number of other examples... Like the companies selling whip cream chargers by the case of 600... You know, for the people that need to make whipped cream by the gallon at home.

For anyone else who was clueless, whip cream chargers are a source of nitrous oxide.

No post body was provided.

Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)

#28

Post by refurb »

rdtsc wrote: post #7

When someone suggests a clever loophole, the response is usually “that would never work, the police and the judge will know exactly what you’re doing”. But somehow, a whole industry developed around the “do not do … detailed prohibited thing”. I guess, because it somehow worked that one time, it became memorable as an exception, while in most cases it wouldn’t fly in court.

Prohibition never had widespread support. People were able to stock up prior to enactment, there were allowances for religious and medicinal use. People made their own alcohol before prohibition and did so after enactment. Enforcement was mostly the “big busts” but it petered out pretty quickly.

So not surprisingly something being illegal or not isn’t the critical factor, it’s the willingness to enforce the law (e.g. marijuana was essentially legal in SF well before the law was changed - you could smoke on the street and the cops wouldn’t do anything).

Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)

#29

Post by inter_netuser »

bruce511 wrote: post #26
mmmpop wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Interesting" perhaps... but our definitions of "cool" vary widely.

Cool because data is always cool :) More seriously,because it would simply be impossible to run these social experiments in normal circumstances. There are other examples; New Zealand and Australia tested a "closed border" approach, Sweden adopted a "personal responsibility" approach. Some places had curfews. The shere variety and scale of the last two years have generated enormous amounts of data, and matching data…

For some, data is not needed to figure out that tyranny isn't worth investigating.

Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)

#30

Post by Terry_Roll »

bruce511 wrote: post #13

One cool thing about the pandemic is that many countries took the opportunity to run large-scale social experiments under the guise of Covid Restrictions. I expect social scientists will be digging into this data for years to come. One experiment in South Africa was banning the sale, or transportation, of alcohol. (Production and consumption was still allowed, just not sale or transportation.) This resulted in a mark…

>One cool thing about the pandemic is that many countries took the opportunity to run large-scale social experiments under the guise of Covid Restrictions. I expect social scientists will be digging into this data for years to come.

So I wonder how much was learnt from the error rates and signal strength variations from wifi enabled devices in a phased array radar setup in order to track human beings walking around their homes. I wonder what patterns were discovered and if it was possible to discover when arguments and falling outs showed up. What other data was garnered that could predict certain behaviours?

I also wonder what would be discovered which will help with the isolation of space travel, like limited human contact, small human group dynamics, things like that.

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