Lifestyle

Money speaks louder — and faster — than science. While proponents and opponents of electronic cigarettes wait for studies to bolster their arguments, there’s already solid and compelling evidence that electronic cigarettes provide at least $40 billion in economic benefits to taxpayers and employers as well as to the health and hospitality industries.

  If you’re wondering who made vaping popular in among Hollywood celebrities, the answer is Leonardo Dicaprio. This actor, producer,...

This is sadly fatalistic argument from smokers, but thankfully for e-cig advocates, it’s once which is actually well-addressed by research.

The American Legacy Foundation has released a statement which makes the bold claims that “consumers are taking unknown risks by using e-cigarettes,” contributing another misinformed, scaremongering piece of pseudo-scientific nonsense to a debate where lives literally hang in the balance. They advocate the use of traditional nicotine replacement therapies, which will generally only successfully help 17 out of 100 people. Let’s think for a second about what they’re proposing that those other 83 people do… Yep, if the current NRT products have failed you, you should be “wary” of using e-cigarettes, so assumedly the only option left from Legacy’s perspective is good old, carcinogenic tobacco.

2016 has gotten off to a good start when it comes to new vaping products, with a range of excellent box mods hitting the market in January, and the constant influx of new sub-ohm tanks showing no sign of letting up. So, what awesome new gear can you pick up this month? Here’s a quick run-down of some of the best options to hit the market so far this year.

Most people who use tobacco, and there are plenty of them, have no idea that this plant is a relative of potatoes, tomatoes and eggplant, just to name a few. This plant, Nicotiana tabacam, is originally from America but is now cultivated in different parts of the world because of the immense demand for it.

An underlying distrust of anything resembling smoking leads some of those in tobacco control to claim that we don’t even need e-cigarettes, and to look for any reason to cast doubt on the value of vaping. But the reason we really do need vaping becomes obvious as soon as you consider things from the perspective of a smoker.

Vapers come in all shapes and sizes and in my 8 years of vaping I’ve never seen two people who...

The Merry E-Cigarette Vaping Christmas Game, by Brian Fojtik.

California Deputy Attorney General Jeanne Finberg has taken it upon herself to impose a non-existent ban on the sale of flavored cartridges, igniting the anger of the e-cigarette community with a move that flies in the face of logic and reason. According to Ms. Finberg, the flavors available in e-cigarette cartridges attract minors to e-cigarettes. Not only is this unsupported by state or federal law, it’s also a completely redundant move because the sale of e-cigarettes to minors has been specifically outlawed in the state since 2010. Regardless, she pursues any company who supplies flavored e-liquids or cartridges with threatening letters and orders to cease selling anything other than tobacco and menthol flavors in the state.

In the US Air Force, e-cigarettes are treated in exactly the same way as tobacco cigarettes. That means if any personnel want to reduce the harm they’re doing to themselves through their nicotine addiction, they aren’t allowed to unless they stand in designated areas with smokers, who are pumping in excess of 7,000 chemicals out into the air. The fact that the e-cigarette users are releasing primarily water vapor doesn't matter in the eyes of the Air Force, and as if this wasn't enough, the anti e-cig efforts they started in 2010 have been redoubled.

Online businesses are booming. Advancements in technology and the ever growing availability of social media continue to shift our focus...

If you find yourself in a debate as to whether e-cigs are just a passing fad, the first thing you need to do is empathize.

Group buys essentially bypass the vendor, or middle man, allowing the consumer to purchase directly from the manufacturer. Massdrop and Congrevape are seeking to standardize vaping group buys to what can be expected with more traditional products.

Companies like Vapor Chef, Namber Juice, and Five Pawns offer ranges of “gourmet” e-liquid, complete with complex, carefully balanced and exotic flavors and borderline pornographic descriptions. But is it all hot air?

Most of us are now well-versed with the 2009 FDA study that found a small amount (1%) of diethylene glycol, a toxic ingredient in anti-freeze, in 1 out of 18 cartridges from just two brands of electronic cigarettes. Not one study since then has found the chemical in any cartridges or liquids, suggesting that the device in question may have been contaminated.

The media feeds on negativity. A story about trace amounts of a carcinogen found in an electronic cigarette is much more likely to be covered extensively and disseminated into public knowledge than ones which show them to be no more dangerous than nicotine gum or patches.

One of the most commonly heard criticisms of e-cigs is that they just allow nicotine addiction to continue in some other form. Yes, some vapers do continue to consume nicotine, and nicotine is a highly addictive drug. There is no denying that; it’s why people smoke cigarettes in the first place!