Caleb Chen, Research Associate at Cal Poly Humboldt’s Dept. of Sociology – Interview Series

One of the clearest signs that cannabis and its academic study have gone mainstream is the growing number of prestigious universities offering programs dedicated to research and industry analysis. These are far more than simple electives; colleges across the country now provide full-fledged degree programs covering everything from botanical research to complex supply chain logistics.

One such institution is Cal Poly Humboldt, located in a region steeped in cannabis history. For a deeper look into their curriculum and the research being conducted there, mycannabis.com spoke with Caleb Chen, a Research Associate at Cal Poly Humboldt’s Department of Sociology.

So what subjects did you primarily study at first the University of Virginia and then The University of Nicosia in Cyprus? How did studying internationally provide you with better perspectives both professionally and personally?

I studied Economics, East Asian Studies, and Mathematics at UVa. A few years later, I completed a Digital Currency MSc from the University of Nicosia program virtually, so while I’ve never been to Cyprus – my international travels to other countries have really shaped how I view culture in general but especially counterculture and specifically cannabis culture. Coming from a nomadic people, my particular life path even before formal schooling involved lots of moving around and starting over in new places. My cannabis journey has in no small part been about finding how cannabis can smooth that and other social processes for me.

It looks like you have quite the expertise covering cryptocurrency and similar topics. During your time covering those subjects, what were the most newsworthy stories or big sweeping changes in the cryptocurrency space that you covered?

I look back on my cryptocurrency news coverage as a trial by fire I stepped into as I was fresh out of school. One of my favorite topics to cover with my cannabis, free market, free speech, and cryptography-savvy background was the development and proliferation of darknet markets. This coverage eventually culminated with a letter sent as part of a letter campaign to the then-incarcerated Ross Ulbricht which – if you’ll allow me to quote my old self – included this still salient line:

I’ve also written about cannabis related blockchain endeavors that have crashed and burned due to lack of understanding from one side about the other and vice versa. All this to say, “most newsworthy” isn’t the particular combination of words that I would use to describe my work during that time besides that singular heartfelt letter precisely because rarely did I get to truly choose what I wrote about.

In sharp contrast, I’m particularly proud of my time as Editor in Chief of Privacy News Online covering internet privacy and internet freedom topics. These experiences running websites for others prepared me to run my own counterculture media company, The Highest Critic, as an ode to the United States’ First Amendment.

Since banking reforms for the cannabis industry are still a while away legislatively, do you think cryptocurrency or similar digital currencies could eventually have a usage for the cannabis industry?

Digital currencies are already a huge part of the cannabis industry whether we think about the amount of people Venmo-ing or Cash App-ing their friends to go in on some bud, or the historically small but recurring volume of Bitcoin transactions tied to cannabis sales via darknet markets, or all the things in between.

The biggest issue with any digital endeavor – whether currency related or not – is how it interacts with meatspace, the IRL, so to say. Let’s just say that wrench attacks are nothing new to the cannabis space; in fact, they’re historically executed by government agencies. Put more concisely: I don’t believe that cryptocurrencies are a viable banking alternative for legally compliant cannabis companies.

All that being said, the ability of the Bitcoin blockchain and other similarly secure blockchains to be used as an immutable third party source of truth for things (ie a genome sequence to prove ownership of a plant cultivar at a specific time) that benefit from being timestamp verified. This use of blockchain technology for timestamp verification is taking off in all industries and has successfully been used in court of law in the cannabis industry and it is where I see the most understandable and tangible progress being made.

What first interested you about writing about the cannabis industry and products? Prior to creating The Highest Critic, what had been your personal and/or professional experience with cannabis?

Shortly after starting my writing career, as a new rearrival to California, I started writing about cannabis for sites like The Stoned Gamer and MERRY JANE around 2014. The thing that first drew me to writing about cannabis was the sheer novelty of exercising my right to free speech.

In 2018, I quit a job that had landed me in Las Vegas, moved into a van, and started The Highest Critic. My personal experiences with cannabis are as a helpful medicine for my particular slant of neurospiciness. My professional experiences with cannabis before that run the gamut but I’ll say this: in some circles I’m known for rolling a mean blunt.

What were the defining moments that led to the creation of The Highest Critic? What gaps in the cannabis industry and information did you hope to fill with this platform?

I remember my first experiences buying something that wasn’t just called kind bud and actually had a cultivar name. Whenever the dealer asked me if I wanted strain A or strain B, I always bought both and on the walk home I’d be looking up information online about the names I was just told and comparing what I had just picked up with pictures and descriptions people were posting online in forums. Suffice to say, I quickly realized that the internet is not a reliable source for information on cannabis, especially not the newest cultivars that are just hitting the streets or shelves.

Since its founding, I’ve hoped that The Highest Critic could lead a charge in the cannabis culture and industry to present truth in marketing about the plants themselves. I have championed including Lineage/Genetics and Original Breeder on every single review that I publish – even if it’s to confirm that the information is unknown or intentionally undisclosed. As a not-so-passive observer, I dare say that this is starting to make a difference, but that’s just me.

The cannabis industry has undergone a bifurcation and it is easy to identify whether a cannabis product SKU is from the side that highlights the plant in their products, and those that don’t. I’m especially proud of my coverage of the legal California market which revealed fully synthetic cannabinoids (THCV) being sold in licensed California dispensaries and a regulatory agency that is asleep at the wheel, if not worse. Read more.

What have been some of the best or most memorable product reviews that The Highest Critic has done and why is it important to have the consumers themselves conduct and write up the reviews?

Since 2018, THC has featured over 100 reviewers from all over the world. The reviewers I feature are constantly seeking the best cannabis possible for their endocannabinoid system and their particular medicinal needs – whether that cannabis is from the legal market or the illegal market.

Everybody’s endocannabinoid system is different. The only way to know if you like something is to try it yourself. When end consumers write reviews, it helps keep reviews objective. When other consumers are able to follow a specific reviewer’s review journey, they are able to compare and contrast the reviewer’s experiences with their own experiences and discover if there is overlap in endocannabinoid system tone, taste preferences, and medicinal needs.

I also try to include COA data so that the reviews can serve as a timestamped datapoint that X cultivar name was associated with Y chemical profile at Z time. This is useful for tracking shifting baseline syndrome as it applies to many of the words associated with distinctive types of cannabis.

What types of articles/content surrounding cannabis science and research do you contribute to Budist?

My writing at Budist focuses on individual reviews of flower and concentrate products as well as focuses on farms, farmers, and cooperatives. I like to take a botany-conscious focus and meld it with a culturally sensitive approach to highlight the traits that we’re really talking about when we refer to distinctive types of cannabis by specific names.

At Budist, alongside Alex Scherma and Claudio Miranda, we’ve published a 2024 Harvest Report Harvest report and are working on a 2025 Budist Harvest Report.

I also serve as a professional roller and information guide at physical events run by Budist, for instance the Woody’s Personal Stash at The Woods WeHo where Woody Harrelson released a new product line highlighting two Emerald Triangle farms that are dear to my heart: Mattole Valley Sungrown and Trinity Alps Canna Craft.

I feel that my most impactful work at Budist has been as a judge at the California State Fair Cannabis Awards. The California State Fair is different from other state fairs because it is enshrined in the state’s constitution and is run by an independent state agency: Cal Expo. As additional historical context, the California State Fair was also the first state fair to have a wine competition way back in 1854. For me, serving as a judge for the first state sanctioned cannabis competition in the world, has been a high honor.

How did you first get the role as a Graduate Research Assistant at the Cannabis Studies program at Cal Poly Humboldt? What were the most frequent topics of your research and studies there?

I came to Cal Poly Humboldt in 2023 to be a research assistant to Dr. Dominic Corva on the Ethnography and Political Economy portion of a Department of Cannabis Control funded study titled: People and Their Plants: A Community-Driven Study. More information on this project can be found here.

While at Cal Poly Humboldt, I combined my access as a cannabis media professional with ethnographic methods to study modern cannabis breeding subculture and answer a simple question: why can’t I find the weed that I want at the dispensary?

I graduated in May 2025 and published my 144 page master’s thesis titled Post Prohibition Changes in Cannabis Genetics based on interviews with self-identified cannabis breeders. My research highlights the bottleneck of available cannabis genetics on both the legal and illegal markets, and the economic strain that causes it.

I also did lots of work tracing the Globalization of Cali Weed and highlighting different aspects of its development and current global use as an unprotected geographic indication.

I’m sure they’re numerous, but what are the advantages of the cannabis program being hosted at the Cal Poly campus in Humboldt?

Cal Poly Humboldt, formerly Humboldt State University, is the largest educational institution in the Emerald Triangle. The Cannabis Studies Program started in 2023 and is a part of the Department of Sociology. It was the first B.A. degree program in cannabis offered in the United States and students can specialize in either Environmental Stewardship or Social Equity.

The historic draw of Humboldt County to young folk around the country now has a slightly more parent-approved and formalized path, and the sheer density of cannabis related opportunities in and around Humboldt County make the program;s location truly special. I can’t imagine anywhere else in California being able to stand up such a program, especially under current regulations and budgetary constraints.

What are you most excited to research/write about in the future through the program at Cal Poly Humboldt?

Since my graduation in 2025, I’ve joined Cal Poly Humboldt’s Department of Sociology as a Research Associate. I’m looking forward to continuing work with the Legacy Genetics: People and their Plants study as well as applying for new funding opportunities.

Cal Poly Humboldt’s Cannabis Studies Program is going to host its 3rd annual Cannabis and Environmental Stewardship Symposium this year. I wish them the best of luck!

With the federal rescheduling to Schedule III eventually being implemented, how do you envision such a huge reform changing the opportunities for further cannabis research?

The biggest benefit I see from the upcoming rescheduling process is the tacit admittal from the government that cannabis has medicinal benefits. This will trickle down, but who knows how long that will take. So many questions and obstacles remain unanswered and in place; i.e. DEA licenses, carveouts for existing state programs, homegrow aka citizen science legality, etc.

I will say that one of the biggest considerations that all cannabis researchers should keep in mind is that much of the research has only been done on cannabis that is not representative of either the cannabis genepool at large or the available cannabis that end consumers actually consume.

It’s tough for me to envision the future but I welcome it. I’m comfortable reporting things I’ve heard while always admitting what I don’t know. I look forward to seeing the implementation of rescheduling, and its effects on research possibilities. The devil’s in the details as to exactly how free the devil’s lettuce will be to research going forward and by whom.

Thank you for joining us, Caleb! For more information on Cal Poly Humboldt’s Department of Sociology, please visit its website.