The calculus book my university used was a loose-leaf "custom edition" which came in shrink wrap. My cal IV prof told the class first day: "I cannot advise you to go down to the copy shop and run off copies of the relevant chapters for your friends. That would be theft and is illegal. Again, I cannot recommend that you go down to the copy shop next to Pizza Hut on Jackson Avenue and run off copies of the relevant chapters for your friends. That is illegal."
Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)
121–130 of 190 posts
Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)
#122Earlier quoted context omitted.
If it's just homebrewing / for personal, family / friends consumption, how would they even find out? A lot of laws are only there to enforce if they actually uncover a big operation. Like, during the 'rona lockdowns you weren't allowed to have more than X visitors, but no policeman would want to go door to door to see if people were having visitors. (actually don't quote me on it, the visitors thing may have been adv…
> If it's just homebrewing / for personal, family / friends consumption, how would they even find out? A lot of laws are only there to enforce if they actually uncover a big operation. True and that's kind of the joke. They aren't even allowed to do visitations without evidence of malpractice. But the laws surrounding it are even stranger: The beer produced should only be consumed at home, any outside consumption wou…
> The background of the law (at least in folk telling) is that the big guys were worried about malt-extract making homebrewing so easy as to make commercial brewing superfluous.
which is funny, since it takes a lot of work to make good beer! most of that goes into sanitization, since with extract you aren't doing a mash, but it could lead to some very bland beers.
Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)
#123In the early 90s the NY post published a similar article about how not to smuggle in cigarettes from the Native American reservations nearby - including which roads to not take and intersections to not be wary of because there were frequently “speed traps” in place to stop vehicles that might be smuggling tobacco - just an FYI which readers should not be interested in. In the 2000s the NY state police started searchi…
When has NY state ever cared about making their budgetary ends meet? They cared that the people had dared to disobey them, not about the money.
Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)
#124Ontario has a bunch of make-your-own wine companies that work like wine bricks. 1. you buy 5 gallons of grape juice for ~$20 per gallon. 2. yeast is dropped into your grape juice 3. you come to the store to decant your grape juice into wine bottles and cork them up. Since no alcohol is bought or sold, you avoid the (very high) taxes on liquor. You end up with ~28 bottles of wine for ~$4 per bottle. It's not the great…
thankfully, here, we have Trader Joe's and their "3 buck chuck". the local Kroger store (Fred Meyer) also has $3 wine, but I think of that as "emergency wine" - the 3 buck chuck is much, much better. I have some questions though: 1. do they teach you about sanitization and airlocks, or is it simply "toss some yeast in this bottle" 2. I'm guessing no aging? it would be awesome if they allowed you to pop some in a barr…
It's only Canadian money. :-)
<$16 USD
Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)
#125Ontario has a bunch of make-your-own wine companies that work like wine bricks. 1. you buy 5 gallons of grape juice for ~$20 per gallon. 2. yeast is dropped into your grape juice 3. you come to the store to decant your grape juice into wine bottles and cork them up. Since no alcohol is bought or sold, you avoid the (very high) taxes on liquor. You end up with ~28 bottles of wine for ~$4 per bottle. It's not the great…
DIY winemaking kits can actually make some pretty decent wines if you spend a bit of time and money getting proper equipment. Not a lot - $100 will get you a really, really good setup with two glass carboys for fermenting, siphons, thief and test jar, hydrometer, corker, etc.
I've been making my own wines for years now. Occasionally I'll do a full from-scratch wine, but more often I buy a $40 kit from Midwest Supplies [0] that has all the components - grape juice concentrate, fruit essence, yeasts, kieselsol and chitosan, potassium metabisulfite as well as full detailed instructions. All you need is four gallons of distilled water. 28 days later, ~30 bottles pretty good wine! It won't win awards or anything, but it'll make a fantastic table wine and great for everyday meals.
The only downside is that you'll spend a bit of time cleaning and sterilizing things and you'll remember all the stuff you forgot from high school chemistry class. :)
Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)
#126Earlier quoted context omitted.
I doubt those “subtle things” were a priority in this case. Or any consideration at all. People didn’t drink this stuff for its flavor.
Not much has changed if you look at the cheap alcohol available.
Even cheap alcohol is much much better than it used to be. Mulled wine was so popular back in the day because wine was barely drinkable. Cocktails exist for the same reason (and that’s why classic recipes are so sweet). It’s a similar thing with classic “ethnic” dishes—they are so rich and flavorful because they needed to cover the taste of marginal meat.
Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)
#127When 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.
The whole gun industry revolves around this. Can't have automatic weapons (unless you buy a preban for $10,000-100,000), fine we'll make a trigger that resets after every shot and your finger will be primed for the next one. Barrel is under 16"? There is this thing called an arm brace (legal for now... sigh). Barrel is under 16" and you want a suppressor? Well if you weld the suppressor on, pay the tax stamp, technically it's over 16" so you're good.
Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
The thing about human psychology is that if you tell someone not to do something, especially something that is not outright harmful to themselves or others, they will yearn to do it. The answer to alcoholism is to de-glamorize it. Young impressionable minds are susceptible to such glamorization. If governments around the world are seriously committed to reduce alcohol consumption, better shun it, rather than putting…
I wonder if they simply banned alcohol advertising what the effect would be. That was a big thing for tobacco in the 90s. I still remember “joe cool” the camel on the back of my parents magazines.
You can see a general non-acceptance of smoking in public. There has been a consistent decrease in the number of smokers, in absolute terms over time.
Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)
#129Ontario has a bunch of make-your-own wine companies that work like wine bricks. 1. you buy 5 gallons of grape juice for ~$20 per gallon. 2. yeast is dropped into your grape juice 3. you come to the store to decant your grape juice into wine bottles and cork them up. Since no alcohol is bought or sold, you avoid the (very high) taxes on liquor. You end up with ~28 bottles of wine for ~$4 per bottle. It's not the great…
Love the use of passive voice! "yeast is dropped", "taxes were evaded"
Re: Wine bricks saved the U.S. wine industry during Prohibition (2015)
#130In the early 90s the NY post published a similar article about how not to smuggle in cigarettes from the Native American reservations nearby - including which roads to not take and intersections to not be wary of because there were frequently “speed traps” in place to stop vehicles that might be smuggling tobacco - just an FYI which readers should not be interested in. In the 2000s the NY state police started searchi…
> They argued that UPS had to be aware of what they were carrying because the shippers were tobacco stores and the parcels were exactly cigarette box sized, thus they were willing accomplices Would that matter? Fully legal duty-paid cigarette boxes would presumably be the same size and shape from the same origin.
The legal standard for a search is probable cause, not beyond a reasonable doubt. I suspect it'd hold up in court.