Here's how it works. The application displays an interactive map dotted with doctors who can prescribe medicinal marijuana treatment for their patients.
It also shows -- after, presumably, users have procured prescriptions -- the medicinal marijuana suppliers within the users' vicinity. And, what's more, the application includes a database of lawyers who specialize in marijuana-related cases, in [case] should users encounter skeptical local authorities. [ABC News [9]]
The whole thing is just brilliant. They'll sell many thousands of these apps at $2.99 each, not to mention additional iPhone sales resulting from the massive press coverage. Of course, any time a marijuana-related story gets big coverage, you can count on someone in the press to botch the story. This time it was Alex Salkever at Daily Finance [10], who wrote:
I expect a backlash will hit Apple for having greenlighted Cannabis. Legalization opponents call marijuana a gateway drug that leads users to harder narcotic substances.
Wait a second. Apple just generated explosive international press for offering an innovative product and here we have a business columnist who thinks it's a mistake? Where is this "backlash" going to come from? If you want a controversy, you're going to have to start it yourself.
Medical marijuana has been legal in California for more than a decade and it's working so well that the Governor is now talking about legalizing marijuana [11]outright. For many years now, the only controversy surrounding medical marijuana has been the DEA's widely unpopular interference with it, and President Obama has drawn nothing but praise for putting a stop to that.
Ironically, Salkever's analysis isn't just wrong, it's really the perfect opposite of what's going to happen here. Apple is doing this precisely because it's a good business strategy to reach out to marijuana culture and especially legal patients. Fears of "backlash" are what led Kellogg's to drop Michael Phelps and they got crucified for it [12], which is exactly what would have happened to Apple if they blocked services for medical marijuana patients.