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I agree that it should be more expensive, but at $5, it wouldn't be a horrible investment.Quote:
Originally Posted by copobo
I understand your dislike of him, but it's difficult for patients like me to hold my personal hate of someone in this industry over access to quality medicine. But, I don't think you have that problem of quality meds, so we're probably coming at this from two sides. I'll check out the link when I get home.
I read that as well. $5 is ridiculous, no clue how they're pulling it off.
I'm really resisting the urge to editorialize right now.
Hi, I just wanted to chime in on this since our name got brought up again here.Quote:
Originally Posted by cologrower420
As many of you know, I (MMJinColorado.com admin) joined up with KindReviews in May and have since been a key member of the team, doing most of the editing and photos since late July. I made this decision primarily because I thought that KindReviews would be a larger outlet for my writing and reviewing since the name is already established in the community to a greater extent than MMJinColorado.com was/is, but also because we saw that we were sitting on common ground in terms of goals, personalities, and drive. I'm very proud to be a member of the KindReviews.com team and because of that, I wanted to address the arguments presented above -- Travis had done basically this a long time ago in that hijacked Releaf Center Jack Flash thread, but we've since changed things around a bit and I wanted to inform everyone of how we work and why:
Firstly, KindReviews.com does not take any money from dispensaries aside from for banner ads, which we actually haven't been pushing hard at all lately... mostly because we do understand the impression that it can give to readers to see dispensary ads on the site. However, we will not back down from this avenue entirely, as our review methodology is sound. Getting some money monthly from a dispensary for a banner ad does not factor into it at all, which will be elaborated upon below.
Secondly, all of our reviews since I've come on have been performed by a 3-person panel. When the site was first created as MileHigh Marijuana Reviews, it was a single person doing most everything... the crew expanded in February, and again in April/May. Basically, we don't have the same 3 people on each and every strain but rather draw from our core group and then have several knowledgeable 'interns' who help us with providing one of the 3 opinions. Basically, this system ensures that if there is a disagreement or a large discrepancy in the experience, we can have another reviewer to chime in and hopefully kill the mystery. Of course there are sometimes still varied experiences, but as the editor, I attempt to incorporate those into the final edit regardless (i.e. "another reviewer experienced stronger effects and felt he needed a nap") to make sure all experiences are accounted for and any apparent biases are controlled-for.
Further, the interns do not know which shop the samples are coming from -- they get nothing but a strain name label on a button bag. This prevents any pre-existing relationships (we all have pre-existing friends in the dispensary field, as 95% of MMJ patients do) or pre-dispositions from influencing the decisions and grades of the reviewer. For the core staff, we also take pictures and pick up samples from time to time, so we have to know where it came from just by the nature of the work. Whether you take us at face value on our promise to always review the STRAIN and not the SHOP or not is up to you... but as has been pointed out previously, shops that have paid us for advertising have received some downright bad grades and we've churned out a ton of "A"s in the past few months, with absolutely no dollars exchanging hands with those shops.
At this point in our lifecycle, free weed does not impress us. We ask for a 2.5g sample, 0.5g of which goes directly to Full Spectrum Laboratories for cannabinoid testing (as of last month). The remaining 2g goes between the 3 reviewers, who normally receive 0.7g apiece, which is enough for two reviews in case a re-review is necessary to nail it down. About half of our strains get a re-review from at least one person... This amount also allows for a tiny sample to remain for a possible 4th reviewer in the case that we need yet another opinion.
We've had shops offer us more than the sample amount to review, normally because it was a great-looking nug that they wanted photographed and did not wish to break it apart. We absolutely draw the line at 3.0g in these cases and have not accepted anything larger than that for a review sample. We want to allow them to choose the med that gets photographed to a certain extent, so some leeway is necessary.
At KR headquarters right now, we have probably 40 tiny pieces of strains sitting in jars that represent our 'archives' (anything that didn't get consumed as a part of the reviews is saved). I say this to emphasize that getting an extra gram from a shop IS NOT going to wow us or make us want to give them a better grade, and it doesn't happen in the first place because we make a point to pay for anything we want beyond the 2.5g we are offered as part of the review. We've gone back to multiple shops to pay for additional amounts, sometimes even when we planned to review it but just needed a bit more for another reviewer, etc.
I'm not sure what else I can say to alleviate that particular worry, but basically, the "bribed with meds" argument is one lacking merit at this point in our business. If we were still a start up that wasn't being offered 2.5g of multiple top shelf strains whenever we walk into the door of a dispensary, then yes, I see the merit in that argument. Because we cannot sell the meds we receive, they have no monetary value to us... we keep them for archiving purposes and for retrospectives at a later date.
So anyway, I just wanted to address these things for anyone that cares. I appreciate that you guys read and look at the site even a little bit, regardless of your opinions on our process. I have complete confidence in our methodology and our review staff, and now that we're also working with Full Spectrum Labs, we can offer both the KR subjective data and the FSL objective quantitative data.
Also, (not to toot my own horn... okay, maybe a little) I've been personally responsible for the recall of well over 20 strains that have been infected with mites, mold, etc. We take patient safety seriously, and each strain that comes to us for review goes through a rigorous scoping process by yours truly before even being sent to FSL or photographed. We've pissed off a few shops initially by telling them that they need to pull their dirty meds, but to a man/woman, they've all come back and realized that we were right and trying to do the right thing for the patients. We provide photographic evidence of all issues we discover and suggest that the meds be pulled from the shelves.
Bottom line is that we're trying to serve as the best patient's guide in Colorado in terms of finding meds that work for you and meet your needs. Scoping the meds we post is a huge part of that, as is the new FSL testing agreement -- this is all very important information that WAS NOT being spread at any visible level except by us and a handful of shops that were testing all of their strains.
If you disagree with our grades or even our methods, you're of course welcome to your opinion -- but I want to assure you that myself and the rest of the crew bust our collective ass for the patients of Colorado and not for any other interests. Our primary purpose is to help patients sort out the MMJ scene a bit and find strains and specific grows that will help their medical conditions, and I think we do that better than any site in the world right now, no contest. The other garbage like MarijuanaReviews.com and whatever else are nothing more than unqualified, untested, unverified, reports from random people who can even buy it from a "private dealer" and post a review... We're the only strain review site with a consistent review crew (3 members including myself have well over 150 strain reviews under their belts), the ONLY site with THC testing numbers, and the ONLY site that is scoping meds for the patients of Colorado.
...Also, we have WAY better eye candy than any other review site. If you don't even like the reviews, at least come check out the pictures and see what the good growers of CO have been producing lately. Since August, I've done all the pictures personally and there is no aftertouching in PhotoShop, etc. -- they come straight out of the camera and are only cropped to size and watermarked before being posted.
If you guys have any comments to share, please e-mail [email protected] to reach all of us or [email protected] for myself personally. Big ups to all you Cannabis.com people, I've missed you being so busy these last few months... haven't been on here more than a few times. Thanks to anyone who reads and comments on the site regularly and to all the shops that help us spread the knowledge by providing samples.
Also, we recently cleaned out our A+ section and will be doing another bell curve-style adjustment of overall grades for the entire site shortly. The reason for that was because some of the A+ reviews had not been performed under our current (and I believe the best) review methodology, some were simply very very old, or had been re-reviewed and lowered... and most of them were simply unavailable to patients at this point, making the high grade not particularly useful to patients.
Post-HB1284 and post-August 1st and/or 31st (vendors), MMJ in this state is a different ballgame... So we figured that a clean slate in regards to A+ ratings will allow shops to get their footing with their in-house grows, etc. and then send us their very best to see where it hits. Any worries about the concentration of certain shops at the tops of our ratings should hopefully be allayed by that, as the A section is from everywhere in the state and from plenty of different shops represented. This, combined with the Full Spectrum Labs testing should hopefully give everyone a pretty complete picture of any given sample we post... that's our ultimate goal.
just wait till you see the rest of the rules. the DOR ain't done yet!
notice him talking about the problem of small non-commercial growers.
Medical marijuana regulation legislation - The Denver Post
Medical marijuana regulation legislation
By Josh Stanley
POSTED: 04/25/2010 01:00:00 AM MDT
When voters passed Amendment 20, Colorado became the only state to constitutionally recognize the rights of qualifying patients to possess and consume medical marijuana.
Unfortunately, Amendment 20 provided limited guidance on how to best meet patient needs, mitigate the potential for abuse, and create clarity for law enforcement and those responsible for the safe cultivation and distribution of medical marijuana.
Colorado is one of 16 states that allow the use of medical marijuana. Several of those states, California in particular, have demonstrated the troubles that can arise absent a consistent and reasoned approach to medical marijuana policy.
With the introduction of HB 1284, Colorado has the opportunity to codify a balanced and comprehensive medical marijuana policy that considers and maximizes the benefits for all potential stakeholders. The commercial dispensary framework outlined in HB 1284 offers the greatest potential for a system that protects patients' rights, ensures safe patient access to clean, quality medicine and provides safety and security for Colorado communities.
From a patient perspective, this model ensures access to quality controlled medical marijuana that is free from pesticides, molds and other harmful toxins that undermine the purpose of ingesting it in the first instance. The commercial model also ensures continued access to strains that effectively treat particular medical conditions and enables patients to obtain those strains in safe, commercial environments, rather than from the back alleys and side streets that have long been the only outlets available to many patients.
With respect to enforcement, a commercial growing and sale system provides more transparency for law enforcement officials and reduces the total number of growing and dispensing operations throughout the state. Without commercial growing and dispensing, the limitation of five patients per grower would require approximately 20,000 small, mostly residential, growing operations to meet the needs of the nearly 100,000 on the state registry, making it virtually impossible for law enforcement to know where such grows are located, whether the products are being sold only to qualified patients or whether they are making their way into the hands of recreational users. HB 1284 will limit the number of operations located in Colorado's neighborhoods and move them into industrial, commercial and agriculture areas.
HB 1284 is not perfect. Portions of the bill potentially undermine the affirmative defense granted to qualified patients under our state Constitution. This provision, and others, needs to be examined and modified. However, the bill sets out a framework that creates a solid starting point that protects the range of stakeholders in this debate.
As medical marijuana discussions continue, it is important to recognize that there are many voices in this debate. With this in mind, legislators should take caution to avoid being misled by those on the fringes. It is no secret that there are those who wish to preserve an unregulated, "wild west" approach because they see the legalization of medical marijuana as the springboard to legalize recreational marijuana.
Conversely, there are those who seek to over regulate to the point of strangling out of existence a legal industry of which they do not approve. For legalization advocates and law enforcement alike, the message from the Colorado legislature should be clear. The cultivation, sale and use of medical marijuana are legal under the Colorado constitution. The cultivation, sale and use of recreational marijuana are not. And the regulatory policy established in Colorado will reflect those realities to protect and facilitate safe and reasonable access to medical marijuana. HB 1284, while in need of some fine tuning, sends exactly that message.
Josh Stanley is president of Coloradans for Medical Marijuana Regulation. EDITOR'S NOTE: This is an online-only column and has not been edited.
Yep, both him and Wanda James are two of the most manipulative self serving greediest narcissitic lying backstabbing PR whores in this industry.
stanley also is the owner of one of the worst fake tans I've ever seen...Dude is orange
Oh quit beating around the bush. Spit out what you really mean will ya?~!~!Quote:
Originally Posted by Zedleppelin
:D
not to mention the fact that this article (unknowingly) puts expectations as to the price for good extracts too low.
some math - fine sift (not green) kief extract from good bud is about 10% yield TOPS.
So, lets assume wholesale is 250... or even lower. lets say 200 oz.
that's less than 3 grams from an oz. that would be $15, for all the work it takes to process $200 worth of weed. something is very wrong, unless this is how they are burning through illegal inventory.
Quote:
Originally Posted by COzigzag
You're funny! :thumbsup: