Comment by liveinoakland | Hacker News Reader

Comment by liveinoakland | Hacker News Reader

Rap genius is the first site in a long while that I discovered and then promptly spent HOURS on in the next few days. Now I can't listen to a song without checking it out. The annotations on all of Kanye's song have a wealth of amazing back story and information. This site is pure gold even if it only ever did lyrics. The idea that they can expand to other verticals is pure diamonds. This site will slay. I think it already leaves Quora in the dust. IMO it's the next big thing blue chip tech co.

PS rap genius annotations implemented on HN would make it a lot cooler. The comments about particular writing style here... u guys should just hop over to Rap Genius and annotate what "hella betta" means. You're living in ancient technology land!

The interesting thing is that there have come and gone browser extensions to do just this for 15 years. Maybe it makes a difference that it's all contained in the rapgenius site rather than overlaid on other sites (propriety problem) with the content served from the extension provider's servers (data protection problem).

The tech isn't enough without the community. Clearly there are some great annotators over on RG. I agree that starting it on a closed website is key. We all know the big hits were just refining things that had been existing in some form or other in the past. FB not first social network, Google not first search engine, etc.

I think there's a moderation angle too, since the old browser extensions invariably resulted in a hundred "LOLFAG" comments on random CNN stories.

You needed RapGenius to figure out what 'ye's was saying? lulz. I wonder if people realize this is the equivalent of an old lady saying "I need Kompozer to edit my CSS". For some reason - albeit illogically - I look at that site and just see a bunch of outsiders monetizing someone else's creativity. Yes there are all the arguments about how the technology can be expanded to other verticals but I mean really. It's mad corny. Next you'll have Oxford tutors walking around singing So Solid Crew lyrics. Sorry I mean Funky Dee's Ruby on Rails remix (what happens in 'napa stays in 'napa..) - Conlige suspectos semper habitos.

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