Bah, I was afraid that throwaway part of my comment would end up getting the focus. My point is just that most people are somewhere in between "want to get drunk" and "don't want to drink at all" when they're socializing, so drinks optimized for that make a lot of sense.
"want to get drunk" and "don't want to drink at all" is literally the entire spectrum, so I think it's safe to say that "most people are somewhere in between" :P
Well, no, the alternative perspective is that most people are at one of the two extremes, which seems to be common, hence the idea in the comment I originally replied to that "more time drinking" is "working against you". My point is very simple: I think lots of people want to spend time drinking (while socializing) without getting drunk.