Winebits 774: Taylor Swift, climate change, Drizly

This week’s wine news: Taylor Swift has unkind lyrics for cheap rose, plus climate change hits Canadian growers and the feds go after Drizly

• We don’t need no stinkin’ rose: This would have been a standalone post on the old blog, when I needed to sacrifice at the altar of the great god Google to attract visitors. And these days, SEO doesn’t get much better than Taylor Swift. But now, thanks to Substack, I can write a silly and short item here and be done with it. Swift, apparently, does not read the blog – there’s a lyric in a song on her new album that talks about getting drunk on cheap, screwcap rose. Heaven forfend. Taylor — Mont Gravet, La Vieille Ferme, Scaia (and its glass cap) and so many more that are cheap and well worth drinking. I’ll even give you the special pop music superstar discount.

• Even in Canada: Grape growers in Ontario are facing a unique challenge from climate change — extreme cold, even in regions used to cold weather. We this in Colorado several years ago, and Ontario growers said last year’s bitter cold snap. Reports the CBC: “extreme, unpredictable swings in weather are having a big effect on Ontario’s wine industry and forcing producers to respond with costly pivots.” One grower estimates that the he lost three-quarters of his crop for 2022 and will lose as much as one half in 2023 from vines that still haven’t recovered from temperatures as low as -30 F.

• Security breach: Drizly, the booze delivery app, is in trouble with the federal government. The Federal Trade Commission has ordered the company, owned by Uber, to destroy unnecessary user data, restrict future data collection and retention, and implement data security requirements. The order comes in the wake of a massive cyber breach two years when the company ignored warnings that hackers could access the data. One particularly egregious flaw made it possible for hackers to mine bitcoin on the company’s cloud system – even after Drizly insisted that its sites were secure. The other thing scary about this? Drizly collected information that had nothing to do with liquor purchases.