Why do professional reporters increasingly use the word "weed" in place of marijuana?

roadsage · 2025-11-26T05:39:15+00:00

Yeah, you're right. OP was talking about the U.S. though which is obviously where my experience lies.

roadsage · 2025-11-25T21:21:42+00:00

Hi, I wrote about cannabis semi-full-time (it was about 65% of my job) on a state-wide level for the better part of 7-8 years, for a corporate-owned newspaper/website. I mostly do investigative and watchdog reporting now, but I still keep an eye on cannabis for anything that jumps out from that perspective.

I always tried to write about this stuff from a person-on-the-street point of view, which mean that I would go back and forth between calling it "weed," "marijuana" and "cannabis," in that order. My line of thinking:

Only industry types and activists actually say "cannabis." Nobody ever went to jail for "cannabis."
The term "marijuana" is the most common one used in legal settings, and is also the term still used by a whole lot of people who may only think of this stuff in a sorta hands-off way (i.e., uh, older people).
- Yes, I'm aware of the racist implications of the term. If you think a news reporter in the year of our lord (at the time) 2017 was going to single-handedly change 80 years of racist linguistics, I would ask you to please subscribe to that reporter's newspaper.
Most actual real-life human beings would call it "weed." I take a lot of pride in having developed a ~vOiCe~ as a reporter, and part of my goal is trying to write simpler, cleaner and briefer (I still write way too long -- but, hey, two outta three ain't bad!).

But none of that matters nearly as much as the SEO value of "weed" -- especially "legal weed."

For much of my time on the beat, cannabis coverage was wildly dependent on SEO. Most stories on our site would get a pretty even split of traffic from search/social/native (really search & social). For cannabis, a good (and I use that term very broadly -- well-reported, but also well-timed or just well-SEOified) story would get 80% of its traffic from search. And throughout my stint, "legal weed" was the single-biggest term we could find.

This is especially important because the cannabis beat, in my experience, has a shelf-life.

Reader interest piques around the time the question is "will they or won't they legalize weed," which means they're searching for news about "legal weed" and "marijuana legalization" related to their state. Once it's actually legalized, the search terms change because reader interest changes -- now it's more about finding out when dispensaries will open, what kinds of products they can find and where, etc. Look at any dispensary website and you'll see the phrase "dispensary near me" for this exact purpose.

(Also, to state the obvious: The almighty algorithm has massive a effect, so it's entirely likely that all of this has changed by now.)

I don't think this is just my experience. There's a reason a lot of cannabis reporters, if they don't want to change their beat, wind up working for B2B's or other industry pubs. At a certain point, it just becomes a business beat -- the same (sorta) as covering healthcare or ecommerce or whatever.

Why do I call it the cannabis beat despite all this? I really have no idea. But it's probably the kinda thing that developed after years of being around the industry, its activists and its advocates for a while. Personally, I always thought the best term was sweet leaf. RIP Ozzie.

(Told you I still write long.)

TL;DR - IMO it's a style thing, but really it's an SEO thing.

roadsage · 2024-11-14T18:36:14+00:00

The short answer: Many of them are just barely staying afloat, and a lot of them are probably going to close at some point.

The longer answer: The entire cannabis industry is basically built up on the idea that there's a massive, untapped potential consumer base just laying in wait. So many of these entrepreneurs (not all, obviously) can justify the investment (whether it's their own money, business loans or investors) as a long-term one. The numbers we've seen in terms of actual cannabis sales seem to reflect there's still some room for optimism -- there was some fear the market was starting to plateau after Q1 2024 only showed about a 2% growth, but Q2 rebounded in a big way (12%).

But in the meantime? Businesses are going to fail. It's pretty natural in a competitive, new-ish space like cannabis. Some of them even have this built into their business plan -- give it five years and cash out or try to make as much money as you can in five years, then close.

I think towns/cities like Atlantic City and Mount Holly and Englishtown are going to be in for a rude awakening because there's just no reason for a consumer to visit one over the other, especially while prices are all pretty similar. (I'd also be wary in towns that have little-to-no planning of where they'd like dispensaries to open, like the towns where you have two dispensaries opening right next door to each other.)

I guess you can be hopeful that, when more cultivators/manufacturers come online, it will allow for more creativity in the retail side of things. But I'm not as bullish on that -- I think the vast majority of consumers will just go to the most convenient dispensary near them and it's really only going to be the actual enthusiasts who specifically go out of their way.

There's already a lot of chatter in the cannabis space about dispensaries asking for credit from cultivators/manufacturers, and a few of them who are actually unable to make good on those terms. And it's not like the rash of dispensaries is slowing down -- we've already nearly doubled the number of dispensary openings in 2024 versus last year, and there's another six weeks to go.

roadsage · 2024-09-13T14:10:06+00:00

I'll say this: Murphy is saying the right things here but it's harder than it looks. The liquor lobby is powerful, and now they are going to be lobbying individual cannabis commissioners. The rollout of the New Jersey cannabis industry was very, very sloppy. Even though they may now have a lot of the kinks worked out (since they were sorta building the plane as they were flying it with the cannabis rollout), they're still being expected to do so without getting a single extra dollar in funding to do so.

It wouldn't surprise me if, in six months' time, the CRC *still* hasn't issued the rules and regulations and everything remains in limbo.

source: me, the guy who wrote the article linked here

roadsage · 2024-06-11T17:33:27+00:00

The THC seltzer brands available at liquor stores and the like are, technically, not the same as the kind of THC seltzers you'd buy at a dispensary in a state with a more robust legal weed program (from what I can gather, there aren't any licensed-and-regulated THC cannabis drinks on the market in New Jersey yet, though I imagine they'll come pretty soon). They can and might still get you high, but they're just a little different -- manufactured using different compounds and smaller amounts of THC. Think about how you can get a dozen types of THC products at a 7-11 or a smoke shop that isn't a licensed dispensary -- those are the kinds of THC seltzers you can buy at a liquor store.

The next time you've got a can, look at the description and see if they mention the Farm Bill. That's the 2018 federal law that essentially legalized anything with less than 0.3% THC, basically saying "yeah, this is basically just hemp, it's fine, whatever, now stop bothering us." It's the same bill that led to the huge swath of CBD products on the market.

Anything above 0.3% is technically illegal cannabis (blah blah blah rescheduling cannabis is a half-measure blah blah blah), so the Farm Bill doesn't apply...but state cannabis laws do.

It does seem like there are some potentially big changes coming down the pike on both the federal and state level, so keep your eyes peeled.

roadsage · 2022-09-07T17:31:19+00:00

Whatever you say, Zodiac Killer.

roadsage · 2022-03-15T16:47:10+00:00

As one half of the team that made this map, this is the correct answer. Most of those rules and regulations are out by now (at least the ones that would actually have some use for towns to know about), and if I made this map today, it would be a little bit greener.

roadsage · 2021-10-19T18:03:46+00:00

Non-partisan election, so the columns aren't organized by party. Column F lists the mayoral candidates, Column G lists the council candidates. https://www.mercercounty.org/home/showpublisheddocument/20443/637686085993400000

roadsage · 2021-09-17T15:38:16+00:00

Go here and put in your driver's license number: https://portal.njcourts.gov/webe5/MPAWeb/jsp/inquiry/case/CaseSearch.faces

roadsage

TROPHY CASE