This week, Mass Roots—a sort-of Facebook for weed lovers—will be one of the first canna-businesses to go public.

Depending on your appetite for certain leafy psychoactives, you may or may not be aware of the quiet revolution that is happening with marijuana-based social media apps. From dating sites like High There and My420Mate to invite-only networking platforms like KushCommon, a recent David and Goliath-like victory from one of their kind has opened the floodgates.

It all started when Mass Roots, an upstart “Facebook for stoners,” took on the mighty Apple after being banned from the app store last November and, somehow, managed to beat the behemoth.

Carlsbad's BudGenius excited at celebrity tie-in; but cannabis group shies from stoner image

A Carlsbad-based company that tests and profiles medical marijuana strains has teamed up with one of America’s best-known stoners.

BudGenius — which doesn’t sell pot, but provides quality-control testing and related services for dispensaries and consumers — announced this week it has acquired the licensing rights to a line of cannabis-related products endorsed by actor/comedian/marijuana activist Tommy Chong.

Chong, 76, is best known for a series of “Cheech & Chong” comedy albums and films he made with Cheech Marin in the 1970s and early ‘80s. The duo’s success was largely based on jokes about their love of marijuana.

Bud and Breakfast has emerged as a pioneer of the marijuana tourism industry, launching the first booking engine on the web designed to help travelers find cannabis-friendly accommodations.

Search results will return available accommodations in places that have legalized marijuana for medical and or recreational use, including U.S. states like Alaska, Colorado, Oregon and Washington as well as foreign countries like Jamaica, The Netherlands and Uruguay.

Since consuming cannabis in public remains illegal, Bud and Breakfast features apartments, cottages and houses were travelers can stay and use marijuana in private. 

NoCo Hemp Expo draws 1,000-plus to second annual event at The Ranch

Justin Petty of Los Angeles isn't too keen on laundry, so he likes to wear his T-shirts for a week.

Petty can wear the shirts multiple times made by the company he co-owns called Recreator Hemp Apparel, because of their material: hemp. Hemp is twice as durable as cotton and is hypo-allergenic and microbial, which prevents the buildup of odor, he said.

"We like to think of hemp as having the performance capacity of synthetics, but it's natural," Petty said.

Recreator Hemp Apparel, a KickStarter project that launched a year ago, imports the fabric from China because of legal issues and then cuts, dyes, sews and prints its line of T-shirts in Los Angeles.

Tripp Keber can’t roll a joint. “But I can certainly pour you a glass of an effervescent adult-flavored sparkling pomegranate soda, and we can experience the benefits of cannabis that way,” says the 46-year-old CEO of Dixie Brands, Inc., whose Dixie Elixirs and Edibles brands are among the biggest names in Colorado’s legal pot business.

Bruce Barcott became an expert on the cannabis industry while researching and writing “Weed the People: The Future of Legal Marijuana in America” (Time Books, available Tuesday) — a book that reflects the ways in which many Americans' outlook on the drug has changed in recent years.

Barcott recounts his own marijuana experiences. They didn't go beyond the sort of youthful experimentation that Americans typically leave behind with the rest of campus life when they move on from college and take on real-world adult responsibilities — until Washington state asked voters about legalizing, regulating and taxing recreational marijuana.

Considering an investment in the cannabis industry? Consider this a brief starting guide to making responsible choices. It may help you determine if considering an investment in the cannabis industry is right for you.

Ground Zero: What is Your Risk Tolerance?

This is such a broad question that a whole series or articles can (and has been) devoted to the topic, and for good reason. Risk tolerance, the amount of financial pain you can withstand, takes into account your age, employment, annual income, expenses, total net worth, asset allocation, long-term liabilities, personal life goals, investment objectives, cultural leanings, ethics and lifestyle.

Complex organizations require talented executive leadership. This is true in the corporate world, as well as in non-profits. In California, medical cannabis patients can form non-profit collectives to cooperatively produce their medicine. It is a legal way to obtain medicine not personally grown. Any group of two or more people who are both qualified patients can exchange medicine and money. This is generically described by the law as a “collective.” However, when a “collective” chooses to file as a non-profit with the state, it is known as a “cooperative.”

CHICAGO  •   Illinois residents have petitioned the state to add more than 20 medical conditions to the medical marijuana program, including anxiety, migraines, insomnia and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Petitioners identifying themselves as veterans of Vietnam and Iraq asked that PTSD be included, making emotional pleas for help, according to 269 pages of petitions obtained by The Associated Press through the state's Freedom of Information Act. The state blacked out the names of petitioners before releasing the documents to protect patients' privacy.

Farmers in Clarendon are preparing themselves to take advantage of the impending changes to laws around the use of marijuana.

To this end, the cultivators have formed the Clarendon Ganja Farmers' Association.

Convenor of the association, Ras Manga, is hopeful that the farmers will reap economic benefits from ganja.

"We had our first meeting last (month) and it was intended to shed some light and bring knowledge to the farmers that have shown an interest in coming together to see how we can develop the industry in Clarendon," he said.

He disclosed that the group was made up of about 30 farmers who are examining the feasibility of exporting marijuana and producing edibles from the plant.