MANCHESTER — A Connecticut advertising firm owner says his Facebook account is currently banned from posting videos because of an ad about medicinal marijuana he tried to post last week.

Kyle Reyes of the Silent Partner Marketing said the video was educational and not meant to sell cannabis on behalf of his client, Arrow Alternative Care.

“It was a series about Canna-Ed, about the education and the benefits of medical marijuana,” Reyes said. “It’s actually videos that the state had already approved and said, ‘You guys can go ahead and market these on social media.'”

But Reyes said when he attempted to upload a Canna-Ed video last week, Facebook blocked it.

Health Canada was forced to create a safety net to prevent abuse after a handful of forged authorizations for medicinal marijuana surfaced, according to emails obtained by CBC News.

Emails released through federal Access to Information laws show that Health Canada was made aware of at least five instances last year where doctors’ signatures were forged on applications for medical marijuana.

In a related problem, specialists were also concerned general practitioners were falsely using their names to approve licences for patients.

In 2012, one specialist physician in British Columbia flagged to Health Canada that another doctor was using his name without his permission to authorize applications under a Category 2 classification.

Marijuana business news website GreenRushReview.com identifies nine cannabis specific factors that startups need to take into consideration.

It can be difficult to start a business of any nature. Venturing into the legal marijuana industry, however, will most certainly lead to numerous challenges not encountered by traditional businesses. Green Rush Review, a marijuana business news website, identifies nine cannabis-specific factors that startups need to take into consideration.

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Yesterday, Oxis International Inc. (OXIS) filed an information statement stating that its shareholders approved a reverse stock split at a ratio to be decided by the company’s board of directors. The reverse split will not be less than 1-for-50 and it will not be more than 1-for-250. The company’s primary reason for the reverse split is to become listed on the NASDAQ

by Seth A. Goldberg

An article in The Philadelphia Inquirer reported about the reluctance of major banks to participate in the marijuana industries in those states that have legalized marijuana for recreational and/or medicinal purposes because marijuana is still a Schedule 1 controlled substance under the federal Controlled Substance Act. I have previously written that lawyers in those states share similar concerns because the rules of ethics prohibit lawyers from assisting clients in illegal activities.

The shuttered marijuana vapour lounge in Vanier vows to reopen as early as this week after the city slapped it with a cease-and-desist order and a hefty fine last Friday.

On its Facebook page, BuzzOn says it is “optimistic” it can reopen its doors to the public by Friday after speaking with a lawyer about rezoning the building.

City officials visited the Montreal Road lounge to serve a notice that BuzzOn is in violation of the building code and must be rezoned as a place of assembly.

Owner Wayne Robillard accused the city of using a “strong-arm tactic” to shut the place down for good.

The city said in a statement the cease-and-desist papers were issued from a safety perspective to keep the business in line with building code requirements.

Oils and extracts, vaporizers, grow lights and joint rollers filled a marijuana convention in Chicago on Wednesday — without a puff of pot in the air or a single leaf of the drug yet sold legally in Illinois.

More than 2,000 people attended the Marijuana Business Conference & Expo, hoping to cash in on a business that is forecast by one industry-backed market research group to grow to $11 billion in annual sales nationwide by 2019,.

Is this Body Shop ad campaign daring or just dopey?

The Body Shop is facing pressure on a number of fronts to drop the latest advertising campaign for its hemp-based skincare products, with social media users and activist group Collective Shout calling out the retailer’s use of an image of a naked man holding an oversized piece of soap in the shape of a hemp leaf.

But one advertising expert says the criticism is just an example of the ongoing “conservative backlash” against advertising that may test some boundaries.

The president of the University of Ottawa says he is not involved in a medical marijuana operation that his wife and one of their children are setting up.

Allan Rock issued a statement Wednesday contradicting a published report that suggested he has a role in a company looking to call itself RockGarden Medicinals.

“I have no involvement with this application nor the proposed business venture that is being planned,” Rock said in a statement to the Citizen. “I am not a director, shareholder, officer, employee or advisor of the company they have incorporated to carry on their business should they be granted a licence. I do not attend meetings, provide counsel, or participate in any other way in the proposed venture.”