I've never tried mushrooms, but the last time I looked at their prices on the dark net markets (probably 2-4 months ago) they were costing ~$20 for what I'm told would be a dose equivalent to ~100ug of LSD. I was buying ~115ug LSD blotters at $3-4 each. Can certainly see based on those prices why it could be profitable to do so.
That said I know that the magic mushrooms pricing was thought by everyone to be massively inflated due to lack of supply at that time, so possibly it was a temporary situation.
Never looked at it myself, think is quite small. But there are plenty of dark net markets that aren't Silk Road.
Since Silk Road 2 was taken down by the feds (sometime last year, around 6-9 months ago I think) the first to look like the biggest was Agora, then Evolution quickly became the most popular due to its nicer functionality (and nicer design), and the fact that Agora often has short periods of downtime due to server load.
Evolution disappeared a few weeks ago, seemingly the owner(s) decided to "exit scam" - i.e. shut down with no warning and steal all BTC stored in the site by vendors/buyers, thought to be worth $8m (plus whatever profit they made from commission in the previous year).
Since then it has been assumed that Agora will take the top spot, however it has had very bad availability with long periods of the site going down, I believe they've publicly said this is due to the influx of Evolution users and that they are working on improving their site infrastructure. The two biggest down sides to Agora are that they don't offer Multisig support (see below), and that their site design/functionality is pretty nasty. Their upside is that they have the most vendors on there, so the best range of drugs to buy. I believe (though could be wrong, it's been a while since I've been on there) they don't allow vendors to sell fraud/etc. related items, so stuff like Uber accounts wouldn't be allowed on there. Not sure on that, though.
Right now there's a lot of uncertainty around regarding which markets to trust, how long they'll last, etc.
Side note on multisig: what this is is basically a three-way escrow. Traditionally dark net markets offered either "finalize early" (vendor gets your BTC as soon as you order) or "escrow" (website stores the BTC until customer is happy to release to vendor, or until the site admins have to decide who to give them to in the case of a dispute). Multisig means that two out of the three parties (site, vendor, buyer) must agree before the BTC gets released to anyone. So this would prevent markets from doing what Evolution did (stealing all the money in escrow), as if they shut down with no warning then any outstanding deals could still be finalised between buyer and vendor (2 out of 3). However, Evolution was actually one of (if not the) first markets to introduce multisig as an option, and nearly everyone was too lazy to figure out how to use it. Most talk since then is along the lines of "we should all be using multisig all the time", yet I still haven't seen any signs of that happening...
Anyway, this reply is way longer than you actually asked about, I just think the world of dark net markets is pretty interesting :)
I just picked up my changa, smoked a little in a spliff but didn't do much (very, very wrong setting, wasn't expecting much - am away from home and was outside). Thinking of getting a bong in the morning, though as I've quit weed and soon will be living somewhere I can't smoke indoors feels like a slightly annoying cost.. Either way, shall be trying to break through when I get home tomorrow night or Saturday - have got equivalent to 1g of pure dmt (2g changa) ready to play with :)
Doesn't sound silly to me. If you like DMT and it lasts longer for you, have you tried acid too? Can be much milder than DMT, but much longer trips. Personally when I smoke DMT (well, changa) it lasts 5-15min so I enjoy it as an experience, but doesn't let me really do any interesting thinking like LSD does. That said, I've only tried DMT a few times (haven't "broken through" yet), but do have a couple of grams waiting for me when I can get somewhere to pick it up...
The vaccination situation proves that there are idiots in the world, if you take those people as example of "can't prove X" then we might as well stop all scientific research right now. There's also people who believe the world is only a few thousand years old.
To get societal (and legal) change, you don't need to convince 100% of the crazies. Convincing most of the sane people is enough.
(I'm not saying only crazies are against psychedelics, just that the vaccination comparison isn't useful.)
Using a throwaway as while I'll talk openly to some friends/family, I don't want my handle and lsd to show up together on Google.
This is a story, an anecdote, and while my view on LSD is positive as a result, definitely shouldn't be read as an endorsement of my actions.
I'm the perfect example of somebody who shouldn't go near psychedelics. I've suffered depression most of my life, and was recently diagnosed as bipolar, though I've only had two real manic episodes. But.. I'm also someone who does stupid things, possibly because of not just despite those things. I've abused coke, benzodiazepines, mdma, alcohol and weed. But never to an extent people around me might notice a problem.
A little while ago, I fell in love with my best friend. It was really fucking hard to deal with (after a few months of hoping it would go away I told her, talked it through and we set about trying to get rid of the awkwardness of staying friends), harder than any other life/love problems I've had. For 6 months I was depressed, had no appetite.. I was forcing myself to eat one meal a day because despite never getting hungry I knew I needed to. Friends told me the appetite was related to my feelings, but I stubbornly dismissed that as pop science - meanwhile I was kind of happy about the appetite, as I was losing inches from my waist.
Then I took LSD for the first time. It was nothing like I'd expected it to be (in my imagination it would be like entering a new world, not just altering the way your mind works in the current world), but it was lovely. A few hours into that trip, I started thinking about my friend. I realised that while I still felt the same way about her.. it didn't hurt any more. It was like this clarity just appeared over the situation that there's nothing I can do about it, so I shouldn't let it hurt me. While under the influence I realised it would probably be back to normal when I woke up the next day, but then it wasn't. I woke up feeling the same way I had while tripping, went into the office, and by lunchtime I was feeling hungry for literally the first time in half a year.
Now I'm in a slightly different place. I'm no longer abusing <something> on a daily basis (the last thing to go was daily weed smoking). I've no interest in benzos or MDMA. I still love coke, but hardly ever do it (twice in the last 18 months, both times someone else's suggestion, both times I didn't want more the next day). And psychedelics... I haven't done them much lately, but have an order on-route from dark net markets of LSD and DMT, largely motivated by wanting some more internal soul searching.
I was hugely grateful to the LSD for that effect it had on me. I've used it quite a few times since then, though it's never made such an impact since. But lately I've been starting to feel down about her again. I don't know if it can help me again.
Long story short... I'm not saying any of my actions were/are sensible or the results deserved. Nor that LSD would help everyone who was in my situation. But as a single anecdote (and hopefully interesting story), it opened my eyes to believing in the sort of trials being described by this article. My pre-existing mental conditions mean I'm probably unlikely to get approved for anything like this, even when it reaches wider access, but if I could, I'd jump at the chance to go through psychedelic therapy with expert scientists guiding me rather than doing it on my own.
(Incidentally: who knows, maybe my next tab will turn me into a schizophrenic: but in the ~15 trips I've had on acid, I'm yet to have a single "bad trip". Same goes for the few times I've tried DMT.)
That said I know that the magic mushrooms pricing was thought by everyone to be massively inflated due to lack of supply at that time, so possibly it was a temporary situation.