Not only is this bad for RapGenius, it's bad for Google, and most importantly bad for Google's users. Yes, RapGenius screwed up, and they've paid the price. But they've publicly recognized what they did and apologized. Google really should reinstate their ranking, because people searching for lyrics right now are being given the huge disservice of using the ultra-spammy lyrics sites from days of yore.
Rapgenius Uniques Fall 90%
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Re: Rapgenius Uniques Fall 90%
#12Hypothetical question: if we ("we" being nebulous) were to unveil that every other major lyrics site (azlyrics, metrolyrics, stlyrics, lyricsfreak, lyrics365, etc. etc.) uses the same SEO tactics, would they receive the same attention and punishment?
Re: Rapgenius Uniques Fall 90%
#13It's quite painful to watch these guys take this beating. What they've done wasn't nice, but the consequences are extreme. What is most concerning is the monopoly Google Search has over driving traffic/revenue for most sites.
Re: Rapgenius Uniques Fall 90%
#14"Don't be evil" Rapgenius got punished for playing the game better than anyone else. Who's to say this couldn't happen to highly relevant sources of information? Wikipedia? Underground sites? This is the equivalent of censorship.
What?
The "game" RapGenius played was the act of being evil.
Re: Rapgenius Uniques Fall 90%
#15"Don't be evil" Rapgenius got punished for playing the game better than anyone else. Who's to say this couldn't happen to highly relevant sources of information? Wikipedia? Underground sites? This is the equivalent of censorship.
First, you don't understand what censorship is.
Second, RapGenius cheated the system. They knew they were cheating the system. They violated the public guidelines that tell you not to cheat the system. And now they are paying the price.
Why is that so difficult to grasp?
Re: Rapgenius Uniques Fall 90%
#16It wasn't so genius to be expository to random people via email, about a link-back scam. Sorry RapDingus, it's over; maybe next go around you'll have less hubris and daringness in using unethical practices. http://jmarbach.com/rapgenius-growth-hack-exposed
If you think this isn't happening all the time, everywhere -- you're mistaken.
Not many funded startups are dumb enough to publicly email folk asking for links in return for tweets/linkbacks. That's pure stupidity; might as well upload a video on a bad political stance with your brand overlayed, because the worms don't stay in the can with any kind of public communication. They should have been more clock-and-dagger with their scheming -- their hubris was their downfall.
Of course many spammy sites use this practice but they don't have the respect from the tech community that Rap Genius warrants as a Y-Combinator funded entity. They lost that, and it's going to be a steep climb for them to find talented folk that want to be part of a seedy operation.
Re: Rapgenius Uniques Fall 90%
#17SEO is such a fickle beast.
To everyone here who's saying they brought this upon themselves, when rules are unenforced and all your competition breaks them, you've already hamstrung yourself if you don't break them too.
If everyone in the MLB is juicing and a rookie gets caught, you don't say "what an idiot", you look at either 1) enforcing the rules on everyone and broadly changing the culture or 2) question whether the rules make sense in the first place.
Re: Rapgenius Uniques Fall 90%
#18Ok, how can Rap Genius recover from this? They're one of the best (and least shady) lyrics sites on the net. They acted immorally, yes, but is justifiable to summarily execute their company? Google has a domineering position in the market, and it's a bit ironic that people were quick to call for Microsoft to be split into multiple companies about a decade ago, yet nobody bats an eye when Google exercises their power.…
They just need to follow the rules. I think once Google takes them out of the sin bin, they should regain their ranking.
I agree with this. They should be fine once they're reinstated.
Re: Rapgenius Uniques Fall 90%
#19"Don't be evil" Rapgenius got punished for playing the game better than anyone else. Who's to say this couldn't happen to highly relevant sources of information? Wikipedia? Underground sites? This is the equivalent of censorship.
Highly relevant sources of information don't show up in the search results anyway.
Re: Rapgenius Uniques Fall 90%
#20"Don't be evil" Rapgenius got punished for playing the game better than anyone else. Who's to say this couldn't happen to highly relevant sources of information? Wikipedia? Underground sites? This is the equivalent of censorship.
Wikipedia isnt gaming the system to make wikipedia relevant. Theyre not ramping up efforts to get inbound links from random blog websites. If anything this shows that RapGenius's numbers were hyper-inflated by SEO games rather than user relevance.