Google Takes Times Square’s Crown With Half-Acre Billboard

As corporate office towers were planned on Times Square in the 1980s, preservationists who were worried the Great White Way might go dark turned off all lights except one with a message to Ed Koch: “Hey Mr. Mayor, it’s dark out there. Please keep the lights on in Times Square.”

Thanks in part to the protest, Times Square landlords have been required since the late 1980s to have advertising on their buildings, said Carol Willis, director of the Skyscraper Museum.