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Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO

news.rapgenius.com

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Re: Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO

#111

Post by obstacle1 »

newnewnew wrote: post #88
gmisra wrote: post #20

This is complicated. 1. rapgenius is probably the least spammy lyrics site on the internet, and definitely so amongst those on the first page of search results. As a consumer, I would not have a problem with Google, et al giving rapgenius results a special algorithmic bump to move them up. I also know that this is an opinion - it may be a popular opinion, but it is still inherently subjective. 2. If I was in rapgeniu…

I can't tell if Hacker News hates African-American culture, or just white boys who take part in it. If they were annotating Opera Librettas and spoke in Victorian English, I'm sure HN would love them. It's not like they are complete posers. They got investment from Nas.

Wait, what? How do you get from "juvenile and offensive" to "hates African-American culture"? That's your own bias at play, there, bud. Loud and clear.

Re: Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO

#112

Post by diydsp »

ripberge wrote: post #17

I feel for Rap Genius. They have a far superior user experience than any other lyrics site out there--but unless they use these tricks they'll never get significant organic Google traffic. The problem is Google's algorithms heavily favor older sites that have been accumulating massive amounts of backlinks with targeted anchor text for years & years. An upstart like Rapgenius doesn't stand a chance. Another problem is…

As massive as it is, I can see Google's needs moving more towards the mainstream. Finding results beyond the first page will fall to other search mechanisms as their inertia develops into a... character.

For example, it's hard to search for certain medical information because of so many pop songs clouding out results for "how the heart beats," etc. There will be more and more aliasing and hacking through keywords to distinguish between pop uses of heart and medical uses of heart until eventually people will learn which search mechanism to use for what purpose. Google will most likely ride the mainstream into the sunset, the Sears of our generation.

Re: Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO

#113

Post by yelnatz »

wetmore wrote: post #106
antr wrote: post #61

RapGenius != Lyrics site Lyrics site != text annotation site Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO != apology If an internet user searches for "Coldplay Yellow lyrics" he/she should be provided with a lyrics website (e.g. AZLyrics) by the search engine. If I search for "Coldplay Yellow annotations" I would like to go to an annotations website like RapGenius. That's what I expect from Google. If RapGenius wants t…

RapGenius is certainly a lyrics site. Why should the user be brought to AZLyrics when RapGenius provides the same content (lyrics) as well as annotations?

They are a lyrics site, yes.

But the whole idea and vision of RapGenius (and why their investors bit) was because of their goal of "annotating the whole internet."

They don't want to be just a lyrics site, they want their annotating paradigm to be the norm with every web page you go to.

Unfortunately, for now, they are just a lyrics site... with annotations.

Re: Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO

#114

Post by Kluny »

seiji wrote: post #62
minimaxir wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since Rap Genius is a YC company, that is unlikely. This also isn't the first time a YC company has had ethical issues called out on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5092711

Does anybody else see the folly in letting a corporation with their own agenda run a real time news site?

"Letting"? You didn't have to come here.

Re: Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO

#115

Post by rralian »

thefallsman wrote: post #12

This seems like a good SEO method - point out that you were doing something extremely minor in violation of Google's guidelines, then point out that everyone else breaks most of the guidelines. All the same time do this in a niche that is known for spam, all the while hoping that Google will read it and manually slap everyone else, giving you a better overall ranking.

What they did doesn't seem "extremely minor" to me. It's about as textbook as you can get as an example of something that will piss off google. Reminds me of all the grey/black methods "facebook apps" (remember them?) would use to trick people into spamming their friends with invites. In my experience, this stuff can work in the short-run of maybe two or three years... and maybe that's all that a lot of startups really care about... flipping a company in a couple years. But if you want to build a lasting business (not sure that's the goal of RapGenius), you build a service that provides real value to people that they gladly talk about to their friends. And you approach SEO by providing interesting, fresh, rich, easily-indexable, accessible content. Not by seeding thousands of Bieber links back to your site.

In my experience the people who do these grey/black things just can't seem to flip that switch to producing value... they look for the angle, how they can parse the terms to their advantage and claim ignorance, and they cannot get out of "lawyer-think." You'll have a hard time convincing them they did anything wrong.

As for calling out their competitors, I actually don't have a problem with that. They're going to be under a microscope from now on and will otherwise be at a disadvantage. Their only reasonable course is to try to level the playing field.

Anyway, forgive the rant. I find these types of tactics gross and I'm glad they're getting penalized.

Re: Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO

#116

Post by newnewnew »

obstacle1 wrote: post #111
newnewnew wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't tell if Hacker News hates African-American culture, or just white boys who take part in it. If they were annotating Opera Librettas and spoke in Victorian English, I'm sure HN would love them. It's not like they are complete posers. They got investment from Nas.

Wait, what? How do you get from "juvenile and offensive" to "hates African-American culture"? That's your own bias at play, there, bud. Loud and clear.

"Stop using slang. Get rid of that swagger. Don't brag. And wear a goddamn button-down shirt."

In other words, stop acting like Jay-Z and start acting like Mark Zuckerberg.

Re: Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO

#117

Post by douglee650 »

ripberge wrote: post #46
davemel37 wrote: post #11

This site should be penalized up the wazoo. This "non-apology" apology, is the classic example of a tattletale at school...the classic excuse of its not my fault cuz everyone is doing it...more importantly, it is wrong, and demonstrates a "our sh don't stick mentality" exchanging a tweet for a link is considered exchanging services for a link, which does indeed fall under the buying links category.) Furthermore, whil…

You are very misinformed if you think these strategies do not work. They are a necessity for a startup in very high competition niches. Take a look at the source of the very reputable: www.usatoday.com/sports/ and search for "NFL Tickets". Blatant link buying by vivid seats. SeatGeek does this all over the place as well. When you have really strong competitors buying links like this and getting away with it--it's the…

it's not about right or wrong, good or bad.

it's about traffic. thus spake zara.

Re: Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO

#118

Post by systematical »

I actually think there site sucks. Like really bad. The idea is great, but frankly I could develop a better UI in less than a month. I'm not saying this to tout myself, I'm saying this because the UI is that bad. Seriously, it looks like something I would have created in my first 2 years of programming.

Re: Open Letter to Google About Rap Genius SEO

#119

Post by look_lookatme »

newnewnew wrote: post #116
obstacle1 wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, what? How do you get from "juvenile and offensive" to "hates African-American culture"? That's your own bias at play, there, bud. Loud and clear.

"Stop using slang. Get rid of that swagger. Don't brag. And wear a goddamn button-down shirt." In other words, stop acting like Jay-Z and start acting like Mark Zuckerberg.

Where is this quote from?
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