Why isn't it in the specs? Did you know that M$ was complicit in creating the spec, and it was in their interest - as they see it - to make the spec nebulous.
I'm sorry for picking a nit, but I specifically stated that "...this does not necessarily mean that they have been dishonest."
The fact still remains, that beyond a great fortune there quite often is a well-hidden crime or at least unethical behavior. Not always; often.
Likewise, you are right that poverty is no guarantee of honesty, either. It's not about whether you're rich or poor, but how honestly you acquired what you have.
But there are volumes of examples of people, who are more willing to cut corners (for their own and their friends' benefit), rising to the top of any structure of power. Some are sociopaths, who are especially good at fooling people into thinking they are gaining their power or wealth unselfishly. And most people have a "default" trust for the wealthy and powerful.
And, again, that does not mean that all powerful, rich people are corrupt. I didn't suggest that, and now I'm spelling it out. And it has a corollary that poor people are not necessarily people of integrity (although my current poverty has at least something to do with my unwillingness to pull the trigger on a guy with a gun on his temple).
With all that, I try to give everyone a fair chance with me. It has hurt me as often as delighted me, but my life is better, if I'm not cynical.
As twostix said, yes, we do have the right to complain. It may not help, but we can complain.
I look at it this way: I do what I can, and then complain with the idea that I may not be the only one, who has noticed the problem. And there is an outside chance that someone will do something if enough people speak up.
To stay on the subject of doing something, we can add a filter [http://www.google-analytics.com/*] (the square brackets are here just to stop/. from treating that as a link) to Adblock Plus, and the browser won't be telling google that we're looking at this page.
You are, unfortunately, right in your assertion. Corporate behavior is a reflection of the values of the people with controlling interests in the corporation.
In addition, a corporation -- especially a big, successful one -- has often been built by people, who are especially willing and able to turn the trust other people place in them -- or the urgent need they have for their services -- to their own benefit. And this does not necessarily mean that they have been dishonest.
Combine this with the fact, that a corporation lacks a "human" face. You can't get in a heated argument with a corporation -- let alone have a reasonable discussion with it. You may meet service personnel, who are willing to engage in either, but the corporation? No. They dispatch an army of consultants, marketers or lawyers, who almost never treat you as a human being.
You may be right that most people don't. Most non-geeks I know have a hard time figuring how much their groceries are going to cost when our VAT rate goes down (now why is there VAT on groceries in the first place? Don't get me started...) or how much their paycheck is going to grow when the employer withholding tax goes down. They care what reality shows are most popular or who wins Idols or whatever.
But that doesn't change the fact that they should. It's one thing to be a member of a consumer co-op and buy stuff at member prices -- and another thing entirely to be looking for daily news, info about your or your friends' minor or major ailments, and have it all recorded forever in a way they are able to associate with your identity.
So Google has not been caught selling the info yet. They have, however, been forced by the DOJ to submit info about search terms and stuff. If Google's revenue takes a big hit for any reason, what's going to stop them from selling the info about the people who seem to spend a lot of time on Chinese dissident sites to the Chinese government? Or just to the highest bidder for whatever info they can offer?
Furthermore, imagine if a perfectly legal hobby were to be criminalized -- retroactively -- say, by a new government elected in a wave of frenzy about national security (totally hypothetical, I know but bear with me). Now if that had been my hobby, I would be a sitting duck for the newly created national security cop unit. I may be a perfectly law-abiding citizen perfectly willing to forgo a hobby if my government tells me it endangers the national security, but I would already be a criminal.
This is just an oversimplified example of what could happen. Much more complex, and at the same time impossible-to-win situations have happened many times over in different parts of the world since mid-1960s when I started following the news. To mention just one example from U.S. history (well researched, doesn't affect us today other than a warning example of just the kind of circs I describe), check out the Senator Joseph McCarthy crusade (and learn that he was just a front man for a lot of mean bullies, who wanted to do their bullying legally).
P.S. I have RefControl with Firefox, I use redirection for most of my systems that directs requests like web bugs to a dummy address etc. I don't do it for all of my systems all of the time, though.
Now, that would cut it in my book. A monopoly abusing its power is worth damning a little. What I found especially heartening is, that as Microsoft has become a patent troll, it is also being sued itself. Perhaps one of these days M$ will have a less stringent approach to enforcing their soft patents?
Most of the world is in chains. They're chained to M$Office by their proprietary document, spreadsheet, presentation etc. formulas.
They're chained to M$ Windoze by the fact that, although you can get a Mac M$Office, you are still screwed in oh, so many ways that eat interoperability.
They are chained to either Windows or MacOs by their media files that can't be transferred to a new computer with another OS because of Digital "Rights" Management (whose rights? one might ask). Sure, iTunes Store dropped DRM, which appears to be a step in the right direction.
If OS'es were interoperable, we probably would have more choice. That some low-level C/C++ code compiles on both Windows and some 'Nix is just that: low-level. The stuff with real portability is run on VMs, and you still have the trouble of translating 'Nix LF chars into Win CR chars or vice versa.
The cell reference notation seems fairly straightforward to me (as well as similar to Excel - except *.xls goes much further in obfuscating contents). B/c ODF is just an archived XML container, you can simply open an *.ods file with an archive tool and go from there. Works for me. I haven't really noticed if the localized versions try to translate the formula names like Excel does.
From my point of view the equation is pretty straightforward: I can open most MSOffice files with OpenOffice, as well as save in MSO format most of the time (lately I even had an example, where a M$-supplied PowerPoint viewer couldn't open a MSO 2007 presentation, and, similarly, Word 2002 had trouble opening a *.docx file even with the M$-supplied plug-in that was distributed for the very purpose - they just want you to buy the full versions of every new suite).
In the last 5 years or so, I have not missed more than some exotic Excel graphs or macros a couple of times, but anyone can open the files I send. The crazy thing about it is that people pressure me to use MSOffice formats (I can see why they are not excited about installing another Office suite). Monopoly Power!
I am not familiar with Mighty Mouse (other than the ancient cartoon), wireless or not, but an optical mouse doesn't need a mouse pad.
Now, I do know that some iMacs come with a classic mouse with a rubbery surface-tracking ball that is picky about the surfaces you use it on, in addition to being insanely sensitive to a little dust. The only surface an optical mouse usually doesn't work on is a high-polish extremely smooth reflective one. My matte-formica-like tabletop is ideal.
I'm sure the British are not as lawsuit-happy as Americans, but I'm sure the lawyers still are going to love this.
Just think all the people, whose faces get inserted into questionable videos. The more rich and famous you are, the more people want to do that to you, and the more likely you are to sue for defamation.
Unless they really are able to sort the videos out in some meaningful way, that will be a cross between 4chan and Big Brother, in a way that minimizes comedy and maximizes misery.
Reselling a book in Finland is totally legal. There may be a point about lending/renting out books if you're not a library, which has to buy a different license. Even then all you have to do is change the term 'rental' to 'sale'.
You sell the book to your friend. It doesn't matter if you just met. There are plenty of services that work like that. Then you buy it back from him a little cheaper, because he didn't really like it. See? Actually, there are tons of second-hand book shops around that do exactly that.
If you live, maybe you'll become another "reality TV" star and give lots of fodder for the tabloids.
If you die, perhaps you'll go in a big enough bang to give an idea for someone to write a blockbuster movie.
If you read, perhaps you'll find a book that infringes on someone's copyright and you can get a finders fee from a trolling lawyer.
If you write, there is always someone who kills someone in a grisly enough way for you to create a thriller script, which the MPAA will buy from you for 5 bucks, 'cause you're a nobody, and make it into at least 5 mil.
The whole ideal of the perfect man and woman are already paving way for people to mate with those people that conform to these standards. Like with feminism... Feminists will only choose their guys who are interested in their personality instead of just 'tits, ass and sex'. This brings us some very positive evolution.
So in the future it may be possible to live more and more on the edge of anarchy.
The ideal of the perfect man and woman has created, among others:
A more lucrative plastic surgery and other appearance-enhancing stuff than ever before (relative to the economy);
A demand for in utero plastic surgery, so the newborns (and their mothers) don't need to go through the trauma of their being ugly (choosing eye color, doing a nose job);
A huge demand for potency enhancing products (you know, the perfect people have kids, who watch porn, and watching it makes them think that the guy must always have a hard on and the girl must always be willing - the girls can fake it; not so with guys)
There was this concept of psycho-evolution. I thought it would be a cool idea, but so far in the last 40 years it seems that the feminists mostly fall for the hunks anyway. The guys don't want the girls for what's between their ears. Today's youth reportedly have a more traditional understanding of gender roles than their parents did. You know, the guy is an aggressive predator, the girl must put up a token resistance so he won't think she's a slut, but must give in anyway. She's only there to satisfy his ego, anyway. Those are the factual trends today.
It's great you were able to learn to walk with them. Sometimes we do need specially designed products or even radical surgery.
I personally have had every single one of my ossicles replaced with ceramic (right ear) and titanium (left). My eardrums have both been replaced twice - with shavings from my own cartilage. I would be deaf without surgeries and need glasses of different strength for each of my eyes for reading as well as seeing further out. I do know about special needs.
I don't want to sound obstinate, but I thought we were talking about basically healthy people here. Runners are seldom people with major problems in their lower limbs, and the ones who do have them usually need tailored solutions, not the new Nikes with this season's hot colors. AFAIK, anyway.
First of all, when our first child was around the age where she started learning to walk, a nurse told us we should not make her wear shoes, at least not regularly. If a kid has shoes on while learning to walk, that can cause serious imbalances in muscle/ligature/bone buildup, leading to damage in them. This was just something the nurse had reasoned out based on other experience about things that are natural.
Add to that the fact that industrial manufacturing can hardly adjust for individual differences. Even the best shoes, if industrially manufactured, are not made to measure. Expensive is just fashionable - but sloppily designed - as often as high quality.
Our muscles were designed to work, to move - however that design came about. From a certain point of view, a law of physics can be considered a design. Randomness also. Let's just try to learn as many as we can about them without inferring things that are not necessarily even related.
I would guess, that TPB just might have gotten away with it, if they had put a TOS there stating that they don't want you to share infringing material.
OTOH, if you're called The Pirate Bay it kind of diminishes the suggested effect...
Although these "pirates" are quite different than the real ones, that threaten people's lives, most notoriously around Somali coast, but also South China Sea, among others. "Software Piracy" is a term that intentionally clouds the issue.
This is typical of a situation, where a dinosaur on top of the food chain tries to defend its position.
I am pretty sure that MPAA/RIAA/Big Publishers would like to put the whole filesharing technology back to the bottle until they find a way to monetize it. Then, of course, it would be accepted.
And I can't get over the Swedish court's argument that making the service available is criminal, because it can be used illegally.
I don't want to make this another religion-bashing thread, but I really don't consider policy and religion necessarily inextricably twined. Common sense is common sense. Any rock band would do, if they had some other attractions besides delinquency.
OTOH, one example of legalization comes from my native country, that had a prohibition around the same time the US did, and repealed it around the same time, too. After the repeal, alcohol consumption spiked up, and kept growing until the WWII, which caused a decline in availability. After that, during the reconstruction boom, people had more money for discretionary spending than ever (this coincided with a major shift from agrarian/subsistence to urban/industrial). This lead to another upsurge.
40 years ago, alcohol sales limitations were cut much deeper (removing state monopoly from beer, among other things) with the idea, that people would learn more moderate habits, when the "forbidden fruit" factor was further removed. 40 years later alcohol is the #1 direct cause of death among men of 25 to 60 years old, followed by cardiac arrest and colorectal cancers, which are both linked to high alcohol consumption.
Alcohol-fueled violence is at its highest since early 19th century, when a peasant rebellion was partially caused by government restrictions on alcohol distilleries. Current alcohol-fueled violence follows the same pattern overwhelmingly: A group of people gather in a home, tavern or something, start drinking, and 6 hours later someone has been shot, stabbed or bludgeoned within an inch of his (usually his) life or dead. Alternately, this doesn't happen until bars close between 2 and 5 AM, and people congregate on the sidewalk, were the smallest perceived slight is enough to spark a free-for-all.
Make of it what you will. We can hardly solve this by arguing anyway.
I suppose you're right in a way. Actually, pot was a letdown for me, and harder stuff just started looking too dangerous to acquire after a while. Booze was the one I got hooked on. It distorted reality just right for me.
I ended up an alcoholic at a young age. Was sober for years, and had a relapse - made the mistake of thinking I could handle it. I probably would be homeless or dead, if I hadn't sobered up. I did it in the interest (among others) of having meaningful human relationships. When I was drinking my relationships went a little sour...
Oh, and one thing is, that addictive behavior is a pattern that tends to get repeated. It doesn't have to be psychotropic substances.
Just to talk back a little: I know damn well I'm not hip, cool or whatever the current hip jargon is for that. I dropped out of it in the 1970s.
And yes, I did it all. Booze, pot and onward. Most of my friends from that period of my life are dead and buried (ODs, shootings, stabbings - all connected with drug buys/busts or then people totally losing it on a mixture of narcotics and running amok).
I just know the reasons I did it. I grew up, but a lot of my friends didn't. And to most of us, although there was the thrill of getting high, it felt edgier to be doing something illegal (few of us inhaled vapors of industrial or household solvents - we weren't stupid as much as we were rebellious).
So I won't buy all the above without some bargaining, although many good points were made.
Slashdot Mirror
Here is the missing link: http://www.pakin.org/complaint
FYI, it is a rant generator. Getting too many clichés in one post makes me suspicious.
Why isn't it in the specs? Did you know that M$ was complicit in creating the spec, and it was in their interest - as they see it - to make the spec nebulous.
Education is never quite free...
I'm sorry for picking a nit, but I specifically stated that "...this does not necessarily mean that they have been dishonest."
The fact still remains, that beyond a great fortune there quite often is a well-hidden crime or at least unethical behavior. Not always; often.
Likewise, you are right that poverty is no guarantee of honesty, either. It's not about whether you're rich or poor, but how honestly you acquired what you have.
But there are volumes of examples of people, who are more willing to cut corners (for their own and their friends' benefit), rising to the top of any structure of power. Some are sociopaths, who are especially good at fooling people into thinking they are gaining their power or wealth unselfishly. And most people have a "default" trust for the wealthy and powerful.
And, again, that does not mean that all powerful, rich people are corrupt. I didn't suggest that, and now I'm spelling it out. And it has a corollary that poor people are not necessarily people of integrity (although my current poverty has at least something to do with my unwillingness to pull the trigger on a guy with a gun on his temple).
With all that, I try to give everyone a fair chance with me. It has hurt me as often as delighted me, but my life is better, if I'm not cynical.
As twostix said, yes, we do have the right to complain. It may not help, but we can complain.
I look at it this way: I do what I can, and then complain with the idea that I may not be the only one, who has noticed the problem. And there is an outside chance that someone will do something if enough people speak up.
To stay on the subject of doing something, we can add a filter [http://www.google-analytics.com/*] (the square brackets are here just to stop /. from treating that as a link) to Adblock Plus, and the browser won't be telling google that we're looking at this page.
You are, unfortunately, right in your assertion. Corporate behavior is a reflection of the values of the people with controlling interests in the corporation.
In addition, a corporation -- especially a big, successful one -- has often been built by people, who are especially willing and able to turn the trust other people place in them -- or the urgent need they have for their services -- to their own benefit. And this does not necessarily mean that they have been dishonest.
Combine this with the fact, that a corporation lacks a "human" face. You can't get in a heated argument with a corporation -- let alone have a reasonable discussion with it. You may meet service personnel, who are willing to engage in either, but the corporation? No. They dispatch an army of consultants, marketers or lawyers, who almost never treat you as a human being.
How in hell did you know so well what my life was like for 15 years? Well, still is, but #4 isn't true for us now...
'People' don't CARE if they are tracked.
You may be right that most people don't. Most non-geeks I know have a hard time figuring how much their groceries are going to cost when our VAT rate goes down (now why is there VAT on groceries in the first place? Don't get me started...) or how much their paycheck is going to grow when the employer withholding tax goes down. They care what reality shows are most popular or who wins Idols or whatever.
But that doesn't change the fact that they should. It's one thing to be a member of a consumer co-op and buy stuff at member prices -- and another thing entirely to be looking for daily news, info about your or your friends' minor or major ailments, and have it all recorded forever in a way they are able to associate with your identity.
So Google has not been caught selling the info yet. They have, however, been forced by the DOJ to submit info about search terms and stuff. If Google's revenue takes a big hit for any reason, what's going to stop them from selling the info about the people who seem to spend a lot of time on Chinese dissident sites to the Chinese government? Or just to the highest bidder for whatever info they can offer?
Furthermore, imagine if a perfectly legal hobby were to be criminalized -- retroactively -- say, by a new government elected in a wave of frenzy about national security (totally hypothetical, I know but bear with me). Now if that had been my hobby, I would be a sitting duck for the newly created national security cop unit. I may be a perfectly law-abiding citizen perfectly willing to forgo a hobby if my government tells me it endangers the national security, but I would already be a criminal.
This is just an oversimplified example of what could happen. Much more complex, and at the same time impossible-to-win situations have happened many times over in different parts of the world since mid-1960s when I started following the news. To mention just one example from U.S. history (well researched, doesn't affect us today other than a warning example of just the kind of circs I describe), check out the Senator Joseph McCarthy crusade (and learn that he was just a front man for a lot of mean bullies, who wanted to do their bullying legally).
P.S. I have RefControl with Firefox, I use redirection for most of my systems that directs requests like web bugs to a dummy address etc. I don't do it for all of my systems all of the time, though.
'damned if you are Microsoft...'.
Now, that would cut it in my book. A monopoly abusing its power is worth damning a little. What I found especially heartening is, that as Microsoft has become a patent troll, it is also being sued itself. Perhaps one of these days M$ will have a less stringent approach to enforcing their soft patents?
I'm not holding my breath.
I would just like to add this from TFA:
If you try hard enough you can create 100% conformant, but non-interoperable, implementations of almost most standards.
That's the nub of it. You can play Devil's Advocate with any standard.
Most of the world is in chains. They're chained to M$Office by their proprietary document, spreadsheet, presentation etc. formulas.
They're chained to M$ Windoze by the fact that, although you can get a Mac M$Office, you are still screwed in oh, so many ways that eat interoperability.
They are chained to either Windows or MacOs by their media files that can't be transferred to a new computer with another OS because of Digital "Rights" Management (whose rights? one might ask). Sure, iTunes Store dropped DRM, which appears to be a step in the right direction.
If OS'es were interoperable, we probably would have more choice. That some low-level C/C++ code compiles on both Windows and some 'Nix is just that: low-level. The stuff with real portability is run on VMs, and you still have the trouble of translating 'Nix LF chars into Win CR chars or vice versa.
As far as I can see, OOo 3 does a pretty clean job of storing formulas (I think it is using ODF 1.2, but anyway):
(left bracket)table:table-cell table:formula="of:=SUM([.C4:.C13])" office:value-type="float" office:value="350.5"(right bracket)(left bracket)text:p(right bracket)350.50(left bracket)/text:p(right bracket)(left bracket)/table:table-cell(right bracket)
The cell reference notation seems fairly straightforward to me (as well as similar to Excel - except *.xls goes much further in obfuscating contents). B/c ODF is just an archived XML container, you can simply open an *.ods file with an archive tool and go from there. Works for me. I haven't really noticed if the localized versions try to translate the formula names like Excel does.
From my point of view the equation is pretty straightforward: I can open most MSOffice files with OpenOffice, as well as save in MSO format most of the time (lately I even had an example, where a M$-supplied PowerPoint viewer couldn't open a MSO 2007 presentation, and, similarly, Word 2002 had trouble opening a *.docx file even with the M$-supplied plug-in that was distributed for the very purpose - they just want you to buy the full versions of every new suite).
In the last 5 years or so, I have not missed more than some exotic Excel graphs or macros a couple of times, but anyone can open the files I send. The crazy thing about it is that people pressure me to use MSOffice formats (I can see why they are not excited about installing another Office suite). Monopoly Power!
I am not familiar with Mighty Mouse (other than the ancient cartoon), wireless or not, but an optical mouse doesn't need a mouse pad.
Now, I do know that some iMacs come with a classic mouse with a rubbery surface-tracking ball that is picky about the surfaces you use it on, in addition to being insanely sensitive to a little dust. The only surface an optical mouse usually doesn't work on is a high-polish extremely smooth reflective one. My matte-formica-like tabletop is ideal.
So no mouse pad needed.
I'm sure the British are not as lawsuit-happy as Americans, but I'm sure the lawyers still are going to love this.
Just think all the people, whose faces get inserted into questionable videos. The more rich and famous you are, the more people want to do that to you, and the more likely you are to sue for defamation.
Unless they really are able to sort the videos out in some meaningful way, that will be a cross between 4chan and Big Brother, in a way that minimizes comedy and maximizes misery.
Yeah, I've noticed sarcasm seldom works...
Reselling a book in Finland is totally legal. There may be a point about lending/renting out books if you're not a library, which has to buy a different license. Even then all you have to do is change the term 'rental' to 'sale'.
You sell the book to your friend. It doesn't matter if you just met. There are plenty of services that work like that. Then you buy it back from him a little cheaper, because he didn't really like it. See? Actually, there are tons of second-hand book shops around that do exactly that.
If you live, maybe you'll become another "reality TV" star and give lots of fodder for the tabloids.
If you die, perhaps you'll go in a big enough bang to give an idea for someone to write a blockbuster movie.
If you read, perhaps you'll find a book that infringes on someone's copyright and you can get a finders fee from a trolling lawyer.
If you write, there is always someone who kills someone in a grisly enough way for you to create a thriller script, which the MPAA will buy from you for 5 bucks, 'cause you're a nobody, and make it into at least 5 mil.
You get the drift...
The whole ideal of the perfect man and woman are already paving way for people to mate with those people that conform to these standards. Like with feminism... Feminists will only choose their guys who are interested in their personality instead of just 'tits, ass and sex'. This brings us some very positive evolution.
So in the future it may be possible to live more and more on the edge of anarchy.
The ideal of the perfect man and woman has created, among others:
There was this concept of psycho-evolution. I thought it would be a cool idea, but so far in the last 40 years it seems that the feminists mostly fall for the hunks anyway. The guys don't want the girls for what's between their ears. Today's youth reportedly have a more traditional understanding of gender roles than their parents did. You know, the guy is an aggressive predator, the girl must put up a token resistance so he won't think she's a slut, but must give in anyway. She's only there to satisfy his ego, anyway. Those are the factual trends today.
It's great you were able to learn to walk with them. Sometimes we do need specially designed products or even radical surgery.
I personally have had every single one of my ossicles replaced with ceramic (right ear) and titanium (left). My eardrums have both been replaced twice - with shavings from my own cartilage. I would be deaf without surgeries and need glasses of different strength for each of my eyes for reading as well as seeing further out. I do know about special needs.
I don't want to sound obstinate, but I thought we were talking about basically healthy people here. Runners are seldom people with major problems in their lower limbs, and the ones who do have them usually need tailored solutions, not the new Nikes with this season's hot colors. AFAIK, anyway.
First of all, when our first child was around the age where she started learning to walk, a nurse told us we should not make her wear shoes, at least not regularly. If a kid has shoes on while learning to walk, that can cause serious imbalances in muscle/ligature/bone buildup, leading to damage in them. This was just something the nurse had reasoned out based on other experience about things that are natural.
Add to that the fact that industrial manufacturing can hardly adjust for individual differences. Even the best shoes, if industrially manufactured, are not made to measure. Expensive is just fashionable - but sloppily designed - as often as high quality.
Our muscles were designed to work, to move - however that design came about. From a certain point of view, a law of physics can be considered a design. Randomness also. Let's just try to learn as many as we can about them without inferring things that are not necessarily even related.
I would guess, that TPB just might have gotten away with it, if they had put a TOS there stating that they don't want you to share infringing material.
OTOH, if you're called The Pirate Bay it kind of diminishes the suggested effect...
Although these "pirates" are quite different than the real ones, that threaten people's lives, most notoriously around Somali coast, but also South China Sea, among others. "Software Piracy" is a term that intentionally clouds the issue.
This is typical of a situation, where a dinosaur on top of the food chain tries to defend its position.
I am pretty sure that MPAA/RIAA/Big Publishers would like to put the whole filesharing technology back to the bottle until they find a way to monetize it. Then, of course, it would be accepted.
And I can't get over the Swedish court's argument that making the service available is criminal, because it can be used illegally.
I don't want to make this another religion-bashing thread, but I really don't consider policy and religion necessarily inextricably twined. Common sense is common sense. Any rock band would do, if they had some other attractions besides delinquency.
OTOH, one example of legalization comes from my native country, that had a prohibition around the same time the US did, and repealed it around the same time, too. After the repeal, alcohol consumption spiked up, and kept growing until the WWII, which caused a decline in availability. After that, during the reconstruction boom, people had more money for discretionary spending than ever (this coincided with a major shift from agrarian/subsistence to urban/industrial). This lead to another upsurge.
40 years ago, alcohol sales limitations were cut much deeper (removing state monopoly from beer, among other things) with the idea, that people would learn more moderate habits, when the "forbidden fruit" factor was further removed. 40 years later alcohol is the #1 direct cause of death among men of 25 to 60 years old, followed by cardiac arrest and colorectal cancers, which are both linked to high alcohol consumption.
Alcohol-fueled violence is at its highest since early 19th century, when a peasant rebellion was partially caused by government restrictions on alcohol distilleries. Current alcohol-fueled violence follows the same pattern overwhelmingly: A group of people gather in a home, tavern or something, start drinking, and 6 hours later someone has been shot, stabbed or bludgeoned within an inch of his (usually his) life or dead. Alternately, this doesn't happen until bars close between 2 and 5 AM, and people congregate on the sidewalk, were the smallest perceived slight is enough to spark a free-for-all.
Make of it what you will. We can hardly solve this by arguing anyway.
I suppose you're right in a way. Actually, pot was a letdown for me, and harder stuff just started looking too dangerous to acquire after a while. Booze was the one I got hooked on. It distorted reality just right for me.
I ended up an alcoholic at a young age. Was sober for years, and had a relapse - made the mistake of thinking I could handle it. I probably would be homeless or dead, if I hadn't sobered up. I did it in the interest (among others) of having meaningful human relationships. When I was drinking my relationships went a little sour...
Oh, and one thing is, that addictive behavior is a pattern that tends to get repeated. It doesn't have to be psychotropic substances.
Just to talk back a little: I know damn well I'm not hip, cool or whatever the current hip jargon is for that. I dropped out of it in the 1970s.
And yes, I did it all. Booze, pot and onward. Most of my friends from that period of my life are dead and buried (ODs, shootings, stabbings - all connected with drug buys/busts or then people totally losing it on a mixture of narcotics and running amok).
I just know the reasons I did it. I grew up, but a lot of my friends didn't. And to most of us, although there was the thrill of getting high, it felt edgier to be doing something illegal (few of us inhaled vapors of industrial or household solvents - we weren't stupid as much as we were rebellious).
So I won't buy all the above without some bargaining, although many good points were made.