This is the first medical journal paper we know of to discuss the use of Kratom in the United States post wide commercial availability that began in late 1999 or 2000.

The authors mention erowid.org, but somewhat mischaracterize it as if we are one of many "online drug encyclopedias", instead of THE online drug encyclopedia with experience reports. The authors use the term "trip reports", seemingly quoting us, but Erowid has never referred to these self-case reports as "trip reports" and instead we use the term "experience reports".

"This study highlights the potential of the Web as a tool for identifying emerging drug practices in hidden populations. Proposals that the systematic assessment of first person reports of drug use episodes from online drug encyclopedias (e.g., ‘‘trip reports’’ on http://www.erowid.org) could identify sentinel drug use events have not borne fruit.16 For a number of reasons (e.g., a fraction of the trip reports submitted to online encyclopedias are selected for release, Webmasters stop releasing reports related to some common drugs, and submissions are edited by the Web site staff), online encyclopedias cannot provide systematic surveillance data on drug use behaviors."

The authors are correct that Erowid.org is not a great place to surveil to find the newest and latest drugs because we intentionally wait to publish about substances until the materials are commercially available to the normal public. We have, in the past, not had this policy and have been unwilling to shoulder the ethical burden of being the initial vector by which widespread publicity is attracted to a new psychoactive drug, plant, technology, or practice. This policy has been in place at erowid since 2001.