Pubdate: Sat, 30 Jan 2016
Source: Orange County Register, The (CA)
Copyright: 2016 The Orange County Register
Contact:  http://www.ocregister.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/321
Author: Brooke Edwards Staggs

AS MARIJUANA GOES MAINSTREAM, HIGH TIMES' TIME HAS COME

The past few years have not been kind to magazines. The industry has 
seen its print readership and advertising dollars decline, forcing 
some magazines to fold and others to shrink.

Not so for pot-obsessed High Times. As the marijuana-legalization 
drive picked up steam, the niche publication added dozens of pages to 
its monthly magazine. And it has boosted circulation by double-digit 
percentages every year since 2013.

That newfound legitimacy will be on display in San Bernardino 
starting today. High Times' 2016 SoCal Medical Cannabis Cup festival 
is going the way of Coachella and expanding to two weekends, bringing 
big music acts, serious lectures, intense competition and an expected 
30,000 adults to the National Orange Show Events Center.

"I think it goes to show the scope of the possibilities as the laws 
continue to change," said Danny Danko, senior cultivation editor at 
High Times. "It's basically like we're going from the underground to 
the mainstream."

Activist Tom Forcade launched High Times in New York nearly 42 years 
ago as a spoof of Playboy, complete with an artful centerfold of the 
pot plant of the month.

The counterculture magazine soon rivaled Rolling Stone's circulation, 
drawing writers like Hunter S. Thompson, who backed its legalization campaign.

Today, 24 states have legalized medical marijuana. Four of those, 
plus Washington, D.C., also allow adults to use pot recreationally. 
And in November, California and nine other states are expected to 
have measures to legalize adult use on their ballots.

As the stigma associated with marijuana fades, Danko, 43, said High 
Times has started to attract advertisers like Sony and coverage from 
traditional media. The magazine has also expanded its reach beyond 
print, producing an album, videos, "pot-casts" and live events like 
the ever-growing Cannabis Cup.

High Times launched Cannabis Cup in Amsterdam in 1988, with a few 
judges sampling from marijuana-friendly coffee shops, then meeting up 
to determine the best strains and enjoy some music. There are six 
Cannabis Cups planned this year, with guests paying upward of $55 a 
day and vendors paying at least a couple of thousand dollars to host booths.

The first SoCal Cup was in 2012 at Los Angeles Center Studios. With 
Los Angeles and second-choice Glendale less than welcoming and crowds 
growing, organizers in 2013 moved to the 120-acre National Orange Show.

Third choice has turned out to be a charm. Though San Bernardino has 
a ban on marijuana businesses, its largest venue has become known for 
ganja-friendly events like Cypress Hill's long-running SmokeOut 
Festival. And Eileen Hards, with the San Bernardino Police 
Department, said there have been very few issues at any of the 
pot-centric events over the past several years.

There are two more pot-related events scheduled at the events center: 
the Abra Ca Dabs festival in March and the 2016 Chalice Festival in 
July. But Cannabis Cup should be by far the largest.

The first night of this year's SoCal Cup will feature performances by 
Grammy-winning The Roots and the eclectic hip-hop trio De La Soul. 
The second weekend will see rappers Wiz Khalifa, Redman, Method Man 
and Ghostface Killah.

There will be a "medicating" area restricted to medical marijuana 
cardholders. The rest of the expo, seminars, food trucks and concerts 
are open to anyone over 18, with the "canna-curious" welcome.

"This is an opportunity for like-minded people to come together and 
feel free to express themselves," said attorney Michael Cindrich, 
co-founder of San Diego-based Gridiron Cannabis Coalition. 
"Oftentimes it's kind of like a coming-out party."

Cindrich's organization will host one of the festival's more serious 
panels, advocating for NFL players to be able to use now-banned 
cannabis to treat the physical ailments they face. Kyle Turley, 
retired All-Pro offensive lineman for the New Orleans Saints, will 
discuss his experience along with former players Eben Britton and 
Nathan Jackson.

But the heart of the event is still a competition.

It's like a beer-tasting contest. Some 50 or 60 pot industry leaders 
are expected to compete in more than a dozen categories, including 
best sativa flower, edible and hybrid concentrate. A panel of experts 
eyes all the entries, smells them, samples them and judges their effects.

The entries are also put through lab tests, Danko said, with points 
for the highest concentrations of THC (tetrahydrocannabinol) and CBD 
(cannabidiol), the active compounds that give pot its effects.

There's even a nod for "best booth," for which Santa Ana-based 
dispensary Dr. Greenthumb, by B-Real of Cypress Hill fame, took 
second place during the 2015 cup.

A win typically means a boost for business, Danko said, with ever 
more attention being focused on those who are blazing the way, as it were.

Thanks to marijuana's growing limelight, High Times has recently 
traded a bit of its underground image for a more buttoned-up one, 
hiring a CEO from Vevo and COO from iHeartMusic. And Danko says he's 
OK with that.

"Along with that underground, rebel, outlaw mentality comes a lot of 
grief as far as people going to prison and being separated from their 
families and having their homes raided," said Danko, who was a 
cultivator before joining High Times in 2002.

"There is more of a corporate attitude and environment, but the heart 
and soul of the underground will remain."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom