The possibilities...
This may have already been brought up.
Maybe it would be cool to have a cannabis asset on Bitshares we could trade pegged to the value of 1 gram? That would be brilliant really.
Where would price feeds come from? The value of 1 gram in the U.S. will be different than in Jamaca and every other country. Cool idea though. Similar to BitMac, tracking the value of a McDonalds BigMac.
That is the point. What is the real value of 1 gram of cannabis? We don't know because we haven't had a way to find out.
So no price feeds, just let it float naturally and the market will discover its true value. It would be absolutely fascinating to try that on a forked version of BTSX, with all major drugs issued as assets. (Note: not saying I endorse this or think it should be incorporated into BTSX. It would make for a fascinating experiment!)
I agree that this would be an absolutely fascinating experiment. That being said, I feel that I agree more fully with OldMan that, at least in this early stage, that could lead to some bad publicity and harm the image of Bitshares, potentially deterring some possible investors.
Cannabis vouchers would not be illegal to trade. Possession might be illegal if you're in a state where it is illegal but trading vouchers is legal as far as I know. Bitshares X is global and not everyone using it is in a part of the country where the commodity is illegal or in a country where the commodity is illegal.
I think we should do it. It's bold enough to get attention, it's something which could probably only be done on Bitshares X, and cannabis is just another commodity really. As long as you're not breaking any laws then do it and if you get bad publicity for trading vouchers which represent cannabis you'll get just as much good publicity as well.
For the record Colorado has legalized recreational marijuana. Most of the United States and millennial in particular support legalization. So I don't see how it goes against our core demographics to have this particular commodity on Bitshares X. People who don't think cannabis should be legal aren't the sort of people who would use Bitshares X anyway.
Not to pee on anyone's parade...but this carries with it the same potential legal issues as "bitCocaine" which has already been discussed (largely as a joke) and thwarted before it even got close to Mick Jagger's nose.
Marijuana is legal in some states. Cocaine isn't legal in any states. So you can legally allow dispensaries to issue their tokens on Bitshares X and I don't see how it would affect Bitshares X.
Should service providers get sued if dispensaries set up a website? Just having cannabis vouchers doesn't mean you've committed a crime because the voucher isn't actual cannabis. If you redeem the voucher in a place where it's legal that at least isn't a crime on the state level. On the federal level it could be challenged in court.
Ultimately the idea is by doing stuff like this we'll either eventually see marijuana legalized on the federal level or more states will legalize it until it becomes another unenforceable federal law. In any case having the commodity on Bitshares X would make Bitshares X ahead of the political trend instead of behind it.
Here is a very important quote which you can spread:
The U.S. response to this tension has thusfar been to call for more "flexibility" in how countries interpret them. This policy was made explicit in recent remarks by Assistant Secretary of State William Brownfield, who last week at the United Nations said that "we have to be tolerant of different countries, in response to their own national circumstances and conditions, exploring and using different national drug control policies." He went on: "How could I, a representative of the Government of the United States of America, be intolerant of a government that permits any experimentation with legalization of marijuana if two of the 50 states of the United States of America have chosen to walk down that road?"
As far as policy stances go this is an aggressively pragmatic solution. The federal government lacks the resources and perhaps the political will to crack down on the legalization states, but it also likely doesn't want to openly admit that it's allowing regulation regimes that openly contradict the provisions of major treaties.
Bitshares X does not have to follow US drug policies. Bitshares X users from the United States have to follow US laws but Bitshares X DAC is not an American citizen.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/10/17/how-marijuana-legalization-in-colorado-and-washington-is-making-the-world-a-better-place/