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The very first thing ever bought or sold on the Internet was marijuana, when Stanford and MIT students used ARPANET to cut a deal in the early '70s. Today, you can order any conceivable pill or powder with the click of a mouse. In Drugs Unlimited, Mike Power tells the tale of drugs in the Internet Age, in which users have outmaneuvered law enforcement, breached international borders, and created a massive worldwide black market.
But, the online market in narcotics isn't just changing the way drugs are bought and sold; it's changing the nature of drugs themselves. Enterprising dealers are using the Web to engage highly skilled foreign chemists to tweak the chemical structures of banned drugs-just enough to create a similar effect and just enough to render them legal in most parts of the world. Drugs are marketed as "not for human consumption," but everyone knows exactly how they're going to be used-what they can't know is whether their use might prove fatal.
From dancefloors to the offices of apathetic government officials, via social networking sites and underground labs, Power explores this agile, international, virtual subculture that will always be one step ahead of the law.
But, the online market in narcotics isn't just changing the way drugs are bought and sold; it's changing the nature of drugs themselves. Enterprising dealers are using the Web to engage highly skilled foreign chemists to tweak the chemical structures of banned drugs-just enough to create a similar effect and just enough to render them legal in most parts of the world. Drugs are marketed as "not for human consumption," but everyone knows exactly how they're going to be used-what they can't know is whether their use might prove fatal.
From dancefloors to the offices of apathetic government officials, via social networking sites and underground labs, Power explores this agile, international, virtual subculture that will always be one step ahead of the law.
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Reviews
"Fascinating and vividly written...His is an informed and thoroughly hip intervention into a public debate that is too often evidence-hostile and tabloid-panderingly disingenuous."
The Guardian (UK)
"Power is a sure guide through this cyberworld, with its torrent of new tablets, capsules and powders...Power is not impervious to the moral ambivalences of this frenetic world...His conclusion that in the digital age, traditional prohibition enforcement is bound to fail seems as undeniable a fact as the M25."
Daily Telegraph (UK)
"[Power] lifts the lid on forums where amateur chemists and dedicated drug experiments compare notes. Anyone who has remained unaware of the existence of the Dark Web will be genuinely shocked at what it's now possible to buy on the streets."
Herald (UK)