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"UPDATED: April 10, 2014 at 2:46 p.m.\nThe Weedmaps ad that was scheduled to debut in Times Square on Apr. 1, but was pulled for review before it could go up, was officially rejected by the CBS legal department on Tuesday, according to a Weedmaps spokesperson.\nA member of the Weedmaps marketing team received a call from Neutron Media, the company which owns the Times Square billboard, Friday and was told Neutron was going to ask CBS to reconsider. The decision to pull the ad for good, however, was officially confirmed Tuesday. Weedmaps was not given a reason for the verdict and has not heard directly from CBS.\n\"I was disappointed,\" Aaron Houston, a strategist at Ghost Group, the company that owns Weedmaps, told Mashable. \"CBS' legal department seems to be behind the times. They don't seem to recognize that the country has rapidly shifted in this area to a solid majority in favor of marijuana legalization.\"\nWeedmaps will receive a full refund for the ad. The site has already been contacted by other companies who are interested in running the spot, but Houston could not yet confirm any specifics.\nCBS declined to comment and Neutron did not respond to a request for comment as of press time.\n\u00A0\nTimes Square is lighting up \u2014 well, almost.\nA pro-marijuana\u00A0legalization advertisement targeting New York's adult crowd was scheduled to debut in the infamous tourist attraction early Tuesday morning,\u00A0the\u00A0Daily News\u00A0first reported. But before the ad could go up on the CBS Super Screen billboard, it was pulled by the corporation for review by its legal team.\nSee also: Luxury Pot Accessories: This Startup Wants to Class Up the Joint\n\"I was surprised, but not shocked,\" Weedmaps CEO Justin Hartfield told\u00A0Mashable. \"The creative was really tame, especially by our standards.\"\nThe ad was purchased by\u00A0Weedmaps, a medical marijuana review site where patients can post their accounts of anything from local dispensaries to doctors. It features a a 10-second looping video that displays the words \"HIGH, NYC\" on a light green background before revealing the name of the company which then vanishes into a cloud of smoke to show the site's URL and a hashtag \u2014 #HighNYC. The planned spot was supposed to\u00A0be displayed at 42nd Street between Seventh and Eighth avenues \u2014 the heart of Times Square.\n\nNeutron Media, the company which owns and manages the billboard, sent an email to Weedmaps in mid-March (which was forwarded to Mashable) approving the ad which was\u00A0meant to present marijuana in a professional light. Even though it doesn't manage the advertising space, CBS can review content that it may not be comfortable associating with its brand since its logo appears on the billboard, the company said. CBS is currently reviewing the Weedmaps ad due to the nature of what it is promoting, according to a spokesperson. Weedmaps only found out that the ad wasn't running yet when they went to Times Square Wednesday morning to see it in action.\nThe National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML)\u00A0was scheduled to run a 15-second pro-legalization ad in 2010 \u2014 on the same billboard as the Weedmaps spot \u2014 but CBS abruptly reversed its approval of the ad soon before it was supposed to go up. After a Change.org petition garnered nearly 10,000 signatures, however, CBS went back on this decision. NORML ran a second ad in Times Square later that year.\nInquiries about Weedmaps and legalization efforts from New York City residents have increased since adoption of pro-legalization legislation has been on the rise in the United States, according to a Weedmaps spokesperson. Neutron originally approached NORML about the current ad, but since a price in the low five figures wasn't in the organization's budget the opportunity got passed on to Weedmaps, the spokesperson said.\n\"A lot of change really needs to happen and this is another flash point in the evolving discussion,\"\u00A0NORML spokesperson Erik Altieri told\u00A0Mashable, referring to the Weedmaps ad.\nWeedmaps has increased in popularity since it launched in 2008. It has seen a 30% growth year over year and had 2.7 million visitors just last month. Its Time Square ad was scheduled to run 18 hours a day for the next two months in addition to a guerrilla marketing campaign around New York City.\nColorado and Washington made waves in November 2012 when state residents voted to legalize recreational use of marijuana. The Compassionate Care Act, which could legalize medical marijuana in New York, has been passed by the state's assembly four times, but still hasn't been brought to a vote by the state Senate, the Huffington Post reports. And it isn't for lack of support from locals \u2014 nearly 90% of adult New Yorkers support the legal use of medical marijuana, according to a poll done last month by Quinnipiac University.\nHartfield hasn't given up hope yet.\n\"I'm cautiously optimistic that CBS is going to do the right thing, however, if they don't we're going to explore other options,\" he said. \"This is America and people still want money, just like people still want weed.\"\nNeutron did not respond to\u00A0a request for comment as of press time.\nEditor's note: This article originally stated that the Weedmaps ad went up in Times Square on Tuesday morning. It has been updated at 12:58 p.m. ET on April 3 to reflect the fact that did not yet go up, but is currently being reviewed by the legal department at CBS.\nHave something to add to this story? Share it in the comments."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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