On Dec. 10, 2013, Uruguay led the way in marijuana reform as the first country in the world to legalize the cannabis trade.

It was former leftist president, Jose Mujica, who pushed the initiative to legalize marijuana.

He argued that the marijuana market already existed and would continue to exist, and legalizing it would allow the state to regulate and tax a commodity that had, up to that point, been fully run by criminal organizations, as reported by Reuters.

Per Reuters:

Rick Steves doesn’t think Big Marijuana should control your pot. That’s one reason people in Washington state should be able to grow their own weed, Steves told KUOW’s Jeannie Yandel.

“I don't want marijuana to go the route of tobacco and have Joe Camel and Big Tobacco and Big Marijuana” dominate the industry, Steves said. “If there's money to be made, it's going to attract big corporate interests and they're going to have the clout. I like the idea of having home grow because it gives people an option to having to buy something from a giant organization. They can just have a few plants on the window sill, and it's not a big deal.”

Sean Parker, co-founder of Napster Inc., photographed on Jan. 27, 2012. 

Whether it's founding Napster, guiding Facebook or investing in Spotify, Sean Parker has developed a reputation for pushing change forward, and now he's at the forefront of California's marijuana legalization movement. This week a competing proposal from the Coalition for Cannabis Policy Reform (CCPR) was folded into Parker's, making his the leading ballot measure, by default, for 2016 in a state with the largest medical marijuana market in the country.

I (sort of) remember my first dab. I had only smoked flower and hash before, so the number of tools and steps laid out before me seemed like a lot to handle (and I wasn’t even stoned yet!). Dabbing may seem daunting at first, but it’s one of those activities that comes easily once you’ve seen it done, so in an effort to avoid having your first time go better than mine, today you're going to learn how to take a dab.

More Ontario students report using cannabis than tobacco, a survey released Wednesday shows.

About 21% of Grade 7 to 12 students in Ontario say they used cannabis during the past year, according to the survey by the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. The usage was higher among older students; 37% of Grade 12 students reported using pot, while the report called marijuana use among seventh graders as "negligible".

Regulate Florida, the group aiming to get a constitutional amendment on the ballot in Florida in 2016 that would legalize recreational pot, is ending their campaign, admitting that they will not be able to get the more than 683,000 signatures needed to qualify for the ballot by next February.

That news was related to supporters on Wednesday day night via a conference call by Michael Minardi, the Jupiter based attorney and campaign manager for Regulate Florida.

Believe it or not, there are still a ton of people out there who have outdated information and still believe that cannabis is a gateway drug.

If you are a regular cannabis consumer, you no doubt know that the gateway myth is a complete lie.

The latest science will tell you it’s a lie and even the U.S. government has admitted that “most people who use marijuana do not go on to use other, ‘harder’ substances.”

Marijuana businesses have long proclaimed that cannabis is drawing visitors to Colorado. Now they have proof.

A study commissioned by the Colorado Tourism Office and presented to the office’s board of directors on Wednesday shows legal weed as a growing motivator for trips to Colorado — conflicting with the mantra of tourism officials statewide that savvy marketing alone is responsible for record visitation and spending in the last two years.

While the state’s “Come to Life” ad campaign is certainly successful, surveys in October and November of potential summertime visitors who were exposed to the state’s tourism ads revealed that the marijuana laws influenced vacation decisions more than 48 percent of the time.

Best420Grinders.net has created a year in review guide to the best marijuana grinders, with fully ranked comparisons and individual product reviews.

Marijuana is now becoming legal in a growing number of states across America, and the result is a huge increase in demand for the accessories required to effectively smoke weed. One of the most fundamental requirements is the grinder, which breaks down the marijuana into small enough pieces to be rolled and smoked. Best 420 Grinders is a website that reviews these products in detail, and it has now released their guide to the top five weed grinders of 2015.

When new Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau was elected to office a short time ago, it was a great day for Canada, and therefore, the world.

For Canadians, a return to power for the liberal party means some serious policy shifts are in order, including overhauling the country’s criminal justice system, boosting spending on health programs, and devising and implementing a system to effectively legalize and regulate marijuana.