Twitter is now the most cannabis-friendly social media platform after recent updates in its policies that allow advertisers to promote cannabis content on its platform.
The social media company run by Elon Musk announced Wednesday that advertisers have to be authorized by health authorities and by Twitter as well as only target the area in which they are allowed to operate in. It also prohibits promoting or offering to sell any cannabis-derived products with the exception of topical hemp-derived CBD topical products containing 0.3 per cent THC or less.
It will allow advertisements in the United States under the categories CBD, THC and other cannabis-related services such as delivery, labs growing tech and others.
In Canada, advertisers are only allowed to promote informational or brand-preference content and can only target jurisdictions where they are licensed in. They cannot promote in Quebec or to Quebec residents and it is the responsibility of advertisers to comply with all laws and regulations.
Specifically, advertisers are prohibited from promoting cannabis content in a way that could be appealing to young persons, using testimonials or endorsements, using depictions of people, characters or animals, or presenting cannabis or its brand elements in a manner that associates it with a particular lifestyle.
BREAKING NEWS 📢@Twitter has announced major policy changes effective immediately:
Now allowing #cannabis advertisers to promote content for CBD, THC and cannabis services across the USA, officially becoming the largest 420-friendly social network. https://t.co/vXhv3vUMjD
— ADCANN (@adcannca) February 15, 2023
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Advertisers must comply with all applicable laws, regulations, rules, and advertising guidelines, and must not target customers under the age of 21 nor be appealing to minors. Landing pages must also be age-gated and sales age-verified.
Advertisements must not use characters, sports persons, celebrities, or images appealing to minors, and should not feature minors or pregnant women as models. Claims of efficacy or health benefits are not allowed and ads must not show pot use, people high or encourage transport across state lines.
Early this month, Twitter also announced is also no longer offering free access to this application programming interface (API) which allowed anyone to extract data from the platform. This decision has caused some scientists to raise concerns about the impact of creating a tiered system to access the platform’s data. Other reports say that the changes have slowed down earthquake relief in Turkey.
New: After the earthquake, 20K+ tech volunteers came together to scrape calls for help on social media to guide rescue & relief efforts.
But Twitter's recent changes to its API & its internal chaos hampered their efforts at a critical time,they tell TIME https://t.co/gBoLwzPV8z
— Vera Bergengruen (@VeraMBergen) February 13, 2023
Natalia@mugglehead.com
