I concur with the anonymous Australia visitor. In Iceland we have slowly moved from beer not being banned (yes it was for decades) and then lengthening opening times. When the beer was allowed the doomsayers said now no one would be sober ever. They were wrong. When opening times were made flexible the doomsayers said we would be hounded by drunken hordes. They were wrong. In the last decade that these two big changes have been ongoing our drinking habits have indeed become more European. People consume as much or slightly more alcohol (as measured in alcohol %) but do it over a longer time and in a more civilized manner. Back when everything closed at 3am the downtown Reykjavík would become a seething mass of puking people (since they just downed lots of alcohol 5 minutes earlier), fighting people, urinating people and all the gory stuff. Now the downtown is easy-going during the night since you can always walk into the next club or pub when you feel like it, take a taxi when you want to (instead of queing for hours like when 3am was the time everyone wanted a taxi) and just enjoy life. Now the doomsayers are warning us against allowing lighter spirits (beer and wine) to be sold in stores (we have state controlled alcohol stores, like Sweden does) because then everyone will be dead-drunk. I'm not buying that argument just like I didn't buy the other two and like I'm not buying the British Isles becoming the capital of stupordom when people can dictate their drinking hours. The first few weeks might show a rise in incidents as people throw themselves head first into it, but then they'll realise the benefits and you will become more European.