ARCATA, California – From the air, the so-called Emerald Triangle looks disconcertingly yellow. Such is the view as pilot Mark Harris tilts his 1957 Cessna 182 at a dizzying angle to get a better view of the rolling California landscape stretching below him.

Harris, an Arcata attorney, often uses his single-prop plane to hop from one county courthouse to the next. But today he’s getting a bird’s eye view of the marijuana farms that dot the forested hills around Upper Redwood Creek in Humboldt County, an area that’s part of the three-county Emerald Triangle region known far and wide for the quantity and quality of its marijuana.

WILLITS -- Except for traffic passing through on Highway 101, this northern Mendocino County city is relatively quiet much of the year. But for three months in the fall, it gets an influx of world travelers lured by marijuana-trimming jobs, temporarily swelling the town's population of under 5,000 and instilling it with an international flavor. 

The medical uses of cannabis and its derivatives are continuing to be discovered at an astonishing rate. This is despite the fact that U.S. government clings to an absurd, baseless classification of cannabis as a Schedule I drug, which severely limits research and scientific advancement.

We recently reported on two rather surprising fields that could benefit from medical cannabis, as well as clinical data that backs its use for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).

Dozens of people attended the Awaken America Cannabis Conference in Sacramento.

The event focused on the use of medical marijuana, specifically for seniors and cancer patients. Many attendees shared their stories.

"I vomited for 15 straight months and lost 53 pounds," user Sioux Colombe said.

"I had a lump on my breast, and they said it was a pre cancerous breast lesion," user, Linda Amelia said.

"I was diagnosed with metastatic cancer," Dr. Marian Fry said.

While these women suffered from different ailments, one thing brought them together. All of them said they have been saved, thanks for medical marijuana.

"It worked overnight. I stopped throwing up, it was amazing," Colombe said.

An article earlier this week in the Sacramento Bee grapples with the new issues facing cannabis farmers now that state laws have finally been passed to regulate the marijuana market. While the current laws only deal with medical cannabis, it is no secret they are intended to be in place to help California transition out of the medical marijuana only model. (2016 is widely expected to be the year the Golden State legalizes recreational cannabis.)

“People should be focused on the business, not hanging out and getting high” insists Carter Laren, co-founder of marijuana startup funder and incubator Gateway, which launches today in Oakland, CA. But even if you’re stoned, you should be able to see the opportunity here. Marijuana prohibition is coming to an end, and massive businesses will grow in its place. Gateway wants to seed them.

As California prepares to bring in the $1 billion medical marijuana industry from the legal shadows, growers and marketers on the pot-rich North Coast are waiting to see how much the massive regulatory structure will cost them and whether to stick instead with the prosperous but risky outlaw status they have lived with for nearly two decades.

The regulatory scheme, which will cost up to $50 million, must be funded entirely by license fees paid by the industry, while new taxes on the cannabis trade — which some advocates say is one of Sonoma County’s major industries — offer the prospect of millions of dollars to help pay for paving roads, hiring police and other public services.

Oakland, CA, November 22, 2015 --(PR.com)-- Gateway Incubator, LLC California’s first cannabis company incubator is opening its doors in Oakland. Backed by MJIC, Inc., the cannabis industry's premier holding company structured to capitalize on the end of marijuana prohibition, in partnership with Ben Larson and Carter Laren, the firm will host a VIP open house on Dec. 4, followed by a Start-Up Showcase for the public on Dec. 5.

Located near Oakland’s Jack London Square in the unconventional Leviathan Building, Gateway's mission is to bring the expertise of Silicon Valley technology entrepreneurship to the burgeoning industry of legal cannabis companies.

Lynette Shaw, the self-proclaimed "godmother of marijuana dispensaries," is thrilled that tech is helping bring cannabis into the mainstream.

"It's fabulous. I'm honored to see my godchildren creating all of this," the 61-year-old said here Friday at the inaugural New West Summit, a two-day conference on the budding billion-dollar convergence of pot with technology, business and media.

Shaw, who in 1997 opened one of the first legal cannabis dispensaries in the US, received a lifetime achievement award at the confab, for her work as an activist in legalizing medical marijuana. And her "godchildren" were well represented at the summit, which wrapped up this weekend.

WILLITS — Except for traffic passing through on Highway 101, this northern Mendocino County city is relatively quiet much of the year. But for three months in the fall, it gets an influx of world travelers lured by marijuana-trimming jobs, temporarily swelling the town’s population of under 5,000 and instilling it with an international flavor.