Is there software in the burgeoning legal marijuana industry? Just a dab. With four states offering legal marijuana, and more than 20 with medical or decriminalized cannabis laws, the business of selling the plant and its derivatives is growing every year.

Naturally, software developers, vendors and startups alike are all looking to cash in on the boom. Silicon Valley, itself located in a state with legalized medical marijuana, has even produced a few pot startups.

Leafly, for example, offers an index of pot shops, crowdsourced information on the powers and effects of various strains, and coverage of the industry as a whole, no different than a wine blog or beer magazine.

Assembly Bill 2516, which would create a new medical cannabis cultivator license for “micro farmers,” passed the Assembly on Wednesday.

“We are trying to ensure small medical cannabis growers on the North Coast can continue to do business as this industry moves forward,” state Assemblyman Jim Wood (D-Healdsburg) said in a release. “It is not fair to require the small farmers to adhere to the same standards as larger operations. We are going to ensure the California Department of Food and Agriculture can develop regulations specific to small farmer practices.”

Convicted pot felons that want to own a legal marijuana business in Oakland will now be prioritized under new, radical permit rules designed to make amends for the United States’ war on drugs.

The city’s new Equity Permit Program calls for 50 per cent of all licenses for medical marijuana facilities to go to Oaklanders imprisoned for a pot offence in the last 10 years, or to residents of six neighbourhoods that police have excessively targeted for drug arrests.

“Communities of colour have been negatively and disproportionately impacted by disparate enforcement of cannabis laws,” reads the ordinance introducing the rules.

Oakland city council voted unanimously to approve the program — the first of its kind in the U.S. — last month.

A group dedicated to keeping marijuana illegal has launched an effort to convince city councils across the country to actively oppose measures to end cannabis prohibition that are expected to appear on at least five state ballots this November.

Marijuana taxes are a two edged sword. On one hand, the tax revenues that the marijuana industry generates (or can generate) are very popular with the public and elected officials. But on the other hand, if taxes are too high, it can really hurt the cannabis consumers that rely on safe access the most. Marijuana can absolutely be taxed too much, and unfortunately that’s exactly how some politicians in California would have it. See the troubling alert that I received below:

A pair of measures facing Siskiyou County voters next week would create strict rules on growing marijuana, including banning outdoor growing and creating fines of up to $1,000 per day for violations.

The measures — both referenda on rules enacted by the Board of Supervisors last year — would also limit the number of plants that anyone could possess to 12, ban delivery of marijuana in the county and require anyone who grows to obtain a license.

Supervisors contend they've modeled the rules after other counties' in California. Their rules closely mirror those of Shasta County, which enacted an outdoor ban and 12-plant limit among other measures last year after voters approved a measure brought by a referendum.

Former NFL running back Ricky Williams is set to assume a key role in Power Plant Fitness, a marijuana-friendly gym expected to open this fall in San Francisco.

The legendary stoner comic celebrated No. 78 at Mack Sennett Studios in L.A.

Hours after Tommy Chong's daughter Rae Dawn Chong posted on Facebook that her famous father was "heartbroken" over being uninvited to speak at a rally for presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, the legendary stoner comic looked to be back in good spirits at his 78th birthday party.

Chong believes Sanders' camp dropped him from the Los Angeles rally because of his association with marijuana, but that didn't stop him from loading his May 24 bash full of the green stuff — and 700 friends, who gathered at Mack Sennett Studios in Los Angeles.

This month, Oakland's City Council unanimously approved a program giving people with former marijuana convictions a leg-up when it comes to entering Oakland's growing legal cannabis industry—a move the City Council sees as a step towards reparations for the drug wars that, in part, led to a boom in America's prison population since the 1970s and targeted people of color.

For the Humboldt farmers, Sonoma County's subterranean tasting rooms and Tuscan affectations offered a glimpse into a rarefied realm of legal intoxicants.

The marijuana growers had driven south from redwood country to the oak and grass hills to take part in an event called “The Women of Wine & Cannabis,” a chance to visit boutique wineries and learn about appellations and branding in the $200-billion retail alcohol market.

But as they sipped wine on a vine-covered terrace of the Mayacama Golf Club that evening, some of them began to see an insidious subtext to the affair.