Rap Genius Receives $15M Investment to Explain More Than Hip-Hop
By Lora Neng
WWW.STREETGANGS.COM STAFF WRITER
October 5, 2012
Rap Genius, a crowdsourced website to decode hip-hop lyrics like a cross between Wikipedia and Urban Dictionary, received a large investment to create the “internet Talmud”–$15 million to be exact. The project started by a lawyer, a programmer, and a Google project manager/hypnotist in 2009 became so popular that rap artists, such as Nas and RZA, even created “verified” accounts” in order to contribute and comment on their own lyrics. And now, Rap Genius has caught the attention of the venture capital company Andreessen Horowitz from Silicon Valley.
In addition to explaining hip-hop songs, the three co-founders, who had met as undergrads at Yale, are planning to expand its content to deciphering law and devlop a button that could be activated for embedded explanations as you are browsing a website, according to Forbes. The site had already changed its name from Rap Exegesis to Rap Genius. With the new scope of subject matter, they may have to rethink its presentation again, but at least it won’t be accused of catering only to white audiences on the assumption that rap is unique in sounding nonsensically worded.
Tags: crowd sourcing, NAS, Rap Genius, rap lyrics, rap slang
Posted by Lora
on Oct 5 2012. Filed under Entertainment.
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how about rap snithches