I’m writing a feature about robotic farming and I’m watching a demonstration of how easy one of the major systems is to use. It’s pretty impressive, with huge trays of plants beings raised into multiple layers so more can be grown on less land. A few minutes in I notice that, despite the narrator talking about growing fresh fruits and vegetables, all the real-world footage is of people growing cannabis.
And then I think: of course it is. Cannabis farmers have no existing infrastructure to pay off, no habits or customs to overcome, no distribution network used to doing things a certain way. They’re designing a system optimized for the modern world, not one built on technology and customs that evolved over centuries.
My conclusion: just like porn created the multi-media Internet, cannabis is forging the path to high-intensity robotic agriculture.