Rap Genius Traffic Has Dropped By Over 80%

This reminds me of the Miley Cirus insanity of past months. She gained more popularity than ever before by acting erotic and capitalizing on peoples' disgust. People were promoting her name in insults and jokes around the world.

Here, the term "Rap Genius" is being popularized by controversy.

wickedOne2• 13 years ago

"there is no such thing as bad publicity…" would be really interesting to see their analytics data / wonder that will be down 80% as well

LammyL• 13 years ago

Is the search interest attributed to people wanting to see how low rap genius is ranked now on google, or people who actually want to visit the rap genius site? I suspect it is the former.

jakub_g• 13 years ago

Honestly I never heard about rapgenius before and never seen it in top 3 in google when searching for lyrics (using google from Europe, logged out). Almost always azlyrics is the top match for me.

iancarroll• 13 years ago

Has Google specified when the penalty will end?

nostromo• 13 years ago

This has moved from an interesting case study in SEO to unadulterated schadenfreude.

arkitaip2• 13 years ago

schadenfreude by who? Certainly not by Google or the media.

tptacek2• 13 years ago

By people who are not fans of Rap Genius, of which there are many. (I like the site, for what it's worth).

GFK_of_xmaspast• 13 years ago

Ain't no schaden in this here freude, pal.

fuddle• 13 years ago

FYI, schadenfreude : a feeling of enjoyment that comes from seeing or hearing about the troubles of other people

beatpanda• 13 years ago

Which is really a shame, because RapGenius is a better lyrics site than all the rest by leaps and bounds. Google is acting like a cartel here and it's absolutely ridiculous. I hope they can beat this thing.

dylandrop• 13 years ago

I do think that RapGenius' punishment is pretty harsh, but I don't think Google's behavior is "absolutely ridiculous". RapGenius did some shady stuff and they should be penalized for it so that this stuff doesn't pervade the web. I also don't think Google is acting like a cartel, in that they aren't extorting RapGenius or killing family members. But maybe Google should've laid off the crusade after a week or so.

rgbrgb• 13 years ago

I mostly agree with you. However, I think the parent comment was referring to the economic sense of "cartel"[1].

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cartel

fragsworth2• 13 years ago

They're using this as a punitive measure to prevent SEO abuse from happening in the future. I don't see much of a problem with it. Google is doing everyone a favor here - including helping out other search engines.

Users who care enough can just go directly to the site.

antr• 13 years ago

google already took equal measures with other companies, pretty public all of them. this story is making a lot of noise on the interwebs because its a known startup with well known investors. had it been a random blog no one would be talking about this.

google's action is only consistent with what it has done in the past with others.

benologist2• 13 years ago

I greatly prefer AZLyrics - they give me the lyrics on a page with just the lyrics, that's all I want nearly 100% of the time.

It's not even a contest: http://i.imgur.com/H1QixcN.png

AznHisoka• 13 years ago

This. Sometimes I feel the ppl claiming rg'S results are better aren't actually even looking for lyrics. They're just comparing the brand name, ui experience, startup culture, tech etc

chaz3• 13 years ago

That's because you have AdBlock running. This is what I got: http://i.imgur.com/R0wOh3R.png

Oh, there was also a big pop up page: http://www.azlyrics.com/eyeblaster/addineyeV2.html http://i.imgur.com/RwiGpdq.png

bichiliad2• 13 years ago

Don't forget that rap genius didn't / doesn't want to just be a lyrics site, they also do the whole "what do these lyrics mean" deal. I'd have no idea what 2 Chainz was going on about half the time were it not for RG.

ZoFreX3• 13 years ago

I quite like Spotify + musixmatch: http://i.imgur.com/S4rn5ug.jpg?1

tsurantino• 13 years ago

Is it though? Though I may be making an assumption that a substantial amount of traffic is retention, if people aren't coming back does that mean that RapGenius really didn't offer that much over other lyrics sites?

falcolas• 13 years ago

Google is a corporation. If you want to do business with them, you follow their rules, or face the consequences. RG didn't follow those rules.

How is this ridiculous?

drig• 13 years ago

My feeling is that Google is acting like a monopoly. It's wrong that a private company is able to exert this much power over others, even if the others are being shady.

chaz3• 13 years ago

If you were Google, knowing that someone is gaming the system, what would you have done differently?

SemanticCoder• 13 years ago

The only shameful thing about it, is that it doesn't happen more often. It took some major tech articles which showed the way RapGenius gamed the system, in order for Google to man up and step in.

spamizbad• 13 years ago

Google penalized BMW, arguably one of the best automobile manufacturers in the world. Very little outrage over that.

Just because you're good at something doesn't mean you're above the rules. I RapGenius was an AWFUL lyric site there would be zero sympathy from anyone over their SEO tactics.

reyan• 13 years ago

I don't argue the merits, but the BMW case is obviously different (BMW core business, dependency on Google results, etc.), hence the disproportionate reaction.

JohnTHaller2• 13 years ago

RapGenius doesn't need to 'beat this thing'. They need to suck it up and deal with the punishment for getting caught cheating. Google has very clear guidelines. RapGenius decided to go blackhat SEO anyway (because 'everyone else does it'). They got caught (blatantly). And now they're dealing with the penalty.

If you don't want to have a 6 month penalty on Google, don't cheat.

sillysaurus2• 13 years ago

Rapgenius needs to find some way to recover from this if they are to survive. What are you saying they don't need to do?

notastartup4• 13 years ago

Google is acting in their best interest which is to see that they are the consumer's sole choice when it comes to search. It makes sense that they would try and make an example to send the message that they are willing to go to great lengths (such as taking out businesses that depend on their traffic source) to those that don't play by the rules.

Azlyrics is the best imho, no heavy javascript, no annotations, just simple lyrics you can copy paste in to your blog or facebook.

michaelrbock• 13 years ago

Hmm...

"This site reaches over 24 million monthly people, of which 12 million (48%) are in the U.S.The typical visitor watches Nickelodeon, visits pbskids.org, and listens to National Public Radio."

kunai3• 13 years ago

All I can glean from that is that the typical visitor to RapGenius can't be bothered to set up a separate user account for his/her children.

This brings up an important point: hardly anyone knows how to configure or troubleshoot their computer. This is by far a more important point than some arbitrary "learn to code" movement that doesn't teach CS, and does NOT teach programming – it's like giving somebody a hammer and telling them to nail a nail into a board of wood, without teaching them how to build anything with that hammer. Instead, we should be teaching people how to maintain the furniture they already own first. I just have zero respect for Code.org at this point, it's their own agenda they're trying to fulfill. They don't care about the future of the U.S., it's just self-aggrandizement as usual.

Sorry for the OT.

KC8ZKF• 13 years ago

I'm confused. Do you think RapGenius visitors are children or adults?

ars_technician• 13 years ago

You bring up an important point. The people pushing code.org assume people have the same 'operational' level of knowledge that a standard power user has.

We should be teaching people how to run virus scans and backups before writing an application that prints a colored letter to the screen.

jawerty• 13 years ago

I'm not sure if it's right or wrong what Google did, but it was certainly a shit business decision. It's Google's job to be a proper search tool for anyone to get the best possible results when searching something as simple as "rapgenius". If I search "rapgenius" and don't get the hugely popular website http://rapgenius.com as the first result, then that's bad service on Google's end.

fragsworth2• 13 years ago

but it was certainly a shit business decision

Not really, because they're using this kind of punishment to make an example of them in order to prevent future SEO abuse by others. It's probably for the better.

Destitute3• 13 years ago

The abuse already goes on, and it's much more involved and 1,000% more effective than trading links.

mschuster91• 13 years ago

+1. Even if RapGenius did cheat, they are still the best solution for Google's customers (i.e. those sheep whose data can be mined and sold).

So I don't get why Google essentially fucks up with their customers.

Destitute3• 13 years ago

Kind of like Too Big to Fail. Hmm...

mcbaby• 13 years ago

I don't think it's fair to make that kind of teleological evaluation... Yes, RapGenius may be the best solution for google's customer. However, if Google permits shady SEO tactics simply because the ends justify the means, then what kind of precedent are they establishing? They would be encouraging that kind of behavior. As a heavy RapGenius user, I'm upset with what occurred, but from an objective standpoint, it makes sense why Google made its decision.

jonknee5• 13 years ago

Why is RapGenius the best result for Google searchers? I just want lyrics, if Google can get me to them I am happy. RG has a ton of bloat that I don't want or need.

cynicalkane• 13 years ago

It's a game theory thing. There have been and will be a huge number of sites that would do anything to be #1 on Google.

In an iterated game, punishments must have a deterrent effect. They might seem disproportional, but Google's goal is not "do what's best for the world in this one instance, ignoring the long-term effects". Google's goal is "make sure nobody will try to cheat Google's algorithms, now or in the future." This is how you build the best search engine in the long run.

It would be the same if Google didn't dominate search, though they'd have to be more careful about optimally calibrating the punishment.

(N.B. This argument remains true even if other people are gaming Google right now.)

tptacek2• 13 years ago

Well put. Also, maybe RG made things worse for themselves with their "apology", which attempted to point out other misdeeds by competing lyrics sites. Had that argument prevailed, the message sent might have been "it's probably safe to game Google as long as you can find other successful-seeming sites playing the same game", which would be a very bad precedent for Google to be facing.

jonknee5• 13 years ago

Humorously, now that RapGenius is dead in SERP it is not a hugely popular website.

loceng• 13 years ago

People couldn't search for lyrics on Google before Rap Genius came along?

norswap• 13 years ago

I've geen getting the same old spammy sites in my results for years. Why not start there instead of the genuinely useful rapgenius?

ZoFreX3• 13 years ago

I agree; I just shrugged and made a mental note to use Bing whenever I look for lyrics. I already use it for image searching and translation.

hydralist• 13 years ago

why is rap genius the best for lyrics? if i want lyrics, i want a simple print out of the lyrics

unknownian• 13 years ago

Perhaps there is a market for a curl or git based lyrics downloader in the terminal.

YungLean2• 13 years ago

They have added value in their annotated lyrics, which comes in handy especially with cryptic word play/slang in rap lyrics.

Destitute3• 13 years ago

You realize any Joe Schmoe can annotate what he personally believes the meaning of a particular lyric is.

If you read any Kanye West lyrics on that site, they break down every line like it's some kind of literary divine intervention of pure brilliance by grasping at every straw possible.

onetimeonly• 13 years ago

I only ever search for lyrics if I want to understand a nuance I think I'm missing. RapGenius has always been my go-to for that.

WaterSponge• 13 years ago

Does this not prove the incentive to win at SEO at all costs?

Has google disclosed other sites penalized for the same behavior?

JohnTHaller2• 13 years ago

All kinds of sites regularly get penalized for this type of behavior.

dmak• 13 years ago

There really needs to be some checks and balances here. Perhaps an opensource search engine? I think an entity like Google having so much control over which businesses die or survive is a little ridiculous.

ouggnay• 13 years ago

Do you have any idea how easy it would be to game an open source search engine?

camus2• 13 years ago

The issue is Google has become the only way to discover content on the web. Before Google, there was much more competition or alternative ways to make content discoverable. Now people basically only "google" stuffs up, and that's not going to change. And search capabilities on most websites are provided by Google too ,that's insane and dangerous. Google has become the WEB and if you are not on Google , you dont exist. Google is now an institution thus "too big to fail",and so much for anti-trust laws.

icebraining• 13 years ago

We already have an Open Source search engine, it's called YaCy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YaCy

Of course, nobody uses it.

baldajan2• 13 years ago

What I find shocking is a single company (Google) has the power to cause such a dramatic decrease of a website it deemed "unworthy".

Sure, it can justify its actions by saying they broke the rules, but pressing the a "death button" for a website is not a solution.

I feel as though Google needs to re-examine their core principles and determine how to better handle an issue like this. Otherwise, I suspect Google might have anti-trust and anti-competitive issues and the government might set the rules for them, and we all know how bad that would be.

olefoo• 13 years ago

Ummm. If Rap Genius had traffic of it's own where people were going to them directly, and google were somehow taking that away from them it might be possible to be sympathetic. But, Rap Genius made a calculated business decision to focus their efforts on getting search traffic and not on building a stable organic foundation to which extra traffic would have been a nice bonus but not the controlling factor in their success.

And really, what value does Rap Genius add to lyrics?

V-22• 13 years ago

but pressing the a "death button" for a website is not a solution.

What is a solution then? It seems like a good deterrent. It has to hurt.

In Poland (where I'm from) they similarly punished Ceneo, Skąpiec, Nokaut (all most popular price comparator services) and even Tesco. See http://www.seoportal.pl/ceneo-skapiec-tesco-ukarane-przez-go... (Polish) or http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&pre... (English by Google Translate).

Not one of these websites has died, but a lesson was taught.

grey-area• 13 years ago

Should Google have that sort of power over almost every business in the world?

baldajan2• 13 years ago

The punishment should fit the crime, and I believe the punishment was far too excessive. In my opinion, I think a solution exists where when one searches for rap genius, rap genius results are on top, not on the 7th page.

I am not defending rap genius for what they did, but criticizing Google for their actions.

smackfu2• 13 years ago

Fundamentally the problem is that a lyrics site is going to mainly get hits from a search engine. Not many people are going to type rapgenius.com and then use their search to find the song they want.

jonknee5• 13 years ago

An interesting side effect of this is the phenomenon of less sophisticated users who use Google as their address bar. If you run a decently well-known website you see this in your analytics reports (at least back when you could see Google search keywords)--repeat visitors coming to your site from Google after searching for your site by name. This is why "facebook" is the top Google search.

Since you can't find RapGenius by searching for it there is a decent sized audience of people who are under the assumption that RapGenius does not exist anymore. It's bizarre to the HN crowd, but very real. Check out their twitter feed:

https://twitter.com/RapGenius

Kerrick• 13 years ago

Specifically, https://twitter.com/RapGenius/status/417354178189459456

jonknee5• 13 years ago

Among others:

https://twitter.com/RapGenius/status/417348237222113281

thedrbrian• 13 years ago

It happened slightly differently to Facebook

http://readwrite.com/2010/02/11/how_google_failed_internet_m...

jameszhang2• 13 years ago

My browser (Chrome) shares screen real estate between its search functionality and address bar. Therefore, if I have searched "facebook" on Google but have not explicitly typed "http://facebook.com" into the address bar, Chrome remembers the "facebook" search as I start to type it out. As a user, the next most obvious action to take is to tab-complete + enter, and voila, there goes the Google search for "facebook".

nawitus• 13 years ago

When I tab-complete + enter, Firefox autocompletes it to http://www.facebook.com and then opens the URL.

ddw2• 13 years ago

I consider myself sophisticated and I still use Google for something like Rap Genius:

"rap genius kendrick lamar swimming pools" would get me there quicker than any other way.

It's incredible that now that search string sends me to other pages that link to RG's lyrics but not directly to theirs.

aliakbarkhan• 13 years ago

If you actually knew how to use Google this wouldn't be a problem. The `site:` filter is your friend.

pfranz• 13 years ago

That's why I /really/ like Chromes "tab to search" feature. When I visit a site with a search field Chrome remembers it. When I start typing the domain the URL bar says "Press TAB to search X", then you type in your search terms.

We're switching from Chrome to Firefox at work and their site-search is incredibly clunky in comparison.

jonknee5• 13 years ago

Well that's different than searching for the URL (though I would suggest using tab to search the site within Chrome). I bet RapGenius got thousands of referrals from the keyword "rapgenius.com" per day. Obviously that will come back rather quickly, but it's something a lot of the HN audience would not normally think of happening.

ZoFreX3• 13 years ago

This is a ridiculous practical weakness to the web we have created. At a technical level it is designed to be relatively decentralised and fault tolerant, but what we have built on top is anything but :(

sprobertson3• 13 years ago

Is it really the web's weakness? Seems like user error to me.

devanti5• 13 years ago

If RG thinks they're so great (and all the bandwagoners on HN), then they should prove it by playing fairly.

My suspicion is that the vast majority of people who search for lyrics don't care about song meanings or annotations. Azlyrics does just fine, which is why they've always been at the top. If people wanted song meanings they would search for song meanings.

My theory is that RG wasn't able to grow as fast as they hoped and have to resort to these methods. How else can RG justify a $15 million investment? Their biggest competitor, songmeanings.com, is bootstrapped with only a couple employees, which shows the true market size of the song meanings / annotations market.

Remember that most consumers want things that are insanely simple and give them immediate satisfaction. I'm not surprised that most people on HN think otherwise as they tend to be deeper thinkers than the average consumer.

wcummings• 13 years ago

I thought annotations were just a way to sidestep paying licensing on the lyrics.

notastartup4• 13 years ago

Very well written.

I think if anything, the fact that they are funded and need to produce positive ROI for their investment creates incentive to "grow at all costs". However, the cost has been too great.

someguyperson• 13 years ago

The difference between RG and songmeanings, and really any other lyrics website in existence, is the quality of the annotations. My habit of listening to rap has changed quite dramatically since I have discovered RG - I don't have to speculate about what a line might mean, because now there's a whole community of people who love rap collate their collective wisdom and tell you what it means. The verified annotations are also amazing...I mean seriously, what other site has artists themselves explaining what they meant for their own songs? I think the $15 million can be justified if you look at their long-term plans. They've built a model with rap and now they're expanding onto rock, pop and poetry. I see it this way: the sell for RG is for their whole slew of websites to become the wikipedia for literary/artistic interpretation, a position they have already locked down with rap. Whether that is worth $15 million is of course up to you, but it looks like it was worth it to some big name investors.

devanti5• 13 years ago

Ok cool. So RG is way better than songmeanings.

That doesn't change the size of the market.

That is, unless you think the quality or features are so good that it will increase the size of the market. In that sense, I don't think RG is groundbreaking enough IMO.

Songmeanings has been around for over a decade. If the market demand was really there ($15mm investment worth), they would naturally gotten some funding, or enough revenue, to improve their product and soak the $ potential out of the market.

yoseph2• 13 years ago

Their ambition isn't limited to the song meanings / annotations market. They wouldn't have raised $15m on that. Look at how they're branching out. PoetryGenius, NewsGenius, etc. They want to annotate the world's information.

That's a huge market and with RG's excellent execution so far (everyone has missteps - remember that), it warrants a $15m bet.

devanti5• 13 years ago

That could be their goal, but it's a lot easier said than done, especially in markets that haven't been executed before.

For example, Rdio tried to do Vdio with video and look how that turned out.

Off the top of my head, I can't even think of one company that expanded to different categories successfully. It's difficult and really rare.

mikeg82• 13 years ago

I wonder if this penalty would have been this severe if their "apology" was an actual apology. If I was in Google's position and had waited to see the RG response, I would have been less forgiving after the tone of that letter. But that is just my opinion...

pastpartisan• 13 years ago

It started out as rap genius and now its extending its tentacles to all types of music and even non-music related subjects Eventually, it would become just another annoying agitator website that clutters the search results with less than helpful results, so this was a good move on google's part.

tzs• 13 years ago

Microsoft should jump on this. Run ads promoting Rap Genius as the best lyrics site on the web, and noting that you can find it easily with Bing, but not with Google. Kind of like those Visa ads that highlighted some cool place and then said don't bother of you use American Express, because the cool place doesn't take AmEx, it takes Visa.

hayksaakian• 13 years ago

I wish I was a Microsoft marketing exec so I could take credit for this idea.

undoware• 13 years ago

I'm sure some exec already has.

scrrr• 13 years ago

Impressive what one company can do to you if they decide you're not playing by their rules. (Not defending RG, I just think this is a good example of how much power Google has..)

bdcravens2• 13 years ago

That's our world. Everytime we trumpet the fact that they're a power that can stand up to the Apples and NSAs of the world, remember where that power and strength comes from. Not a bad thing, merely a double-edged sword.

crazygringo• 13 years ago

I find Google's actions to be bizarre.

Getting people to link to you is what SEO is all about. Basically every site concerned with SEO does it in one form or another -- I thought this was what most every blog affiliate program was about!

So Google decides to "punish" RapGenius just because its program got a little bit of public notice, while 99.9% of other sites which do the same, continue doing the same thing, unpunished?

It just comes across as capricious and petty. For a site as large as Google, there should be some kind of due process involved with clear published guidelines, or (preferably) they should just work on improving their algorithm.

How is what Rap Genius is doing any different than Amazon or iTunes paying you for affiliate links, or you paying a blog to advertise you, or buying a friend a beer to include a link to you? Where exactly does the line get drawn?

sanswork3• 13 years ago

There are clear guidelines and due process.

Amazon and iTunes aren't paying you for the link they are paying you for the sale.

In the second and third cases it is no different if you're paying for a keyword link and if Google found out about it you would be penalized.

jonahx• 13 years ago

Where can you find those guidelines?

velis_vel• 13 years ago

How is what Rap Genius is doing any different than Amazon or iTunes paying you for affiliate links, or you paying a blog to advertise you, or buying a friend a beer to include a link to you?

I don't know about affiliate links, but paying a blog to advertise you will also land you on Google's shitlist (unless you mark the link nofollow, in which case they don't care.)

Edit: according to http://www.webpronews.com/heres-what-googles-matt-cutts-says... you are actually supposed to nofollow affiliate links but they can usually handle it automatically for big sites like Amazon or iTunes.

dpatrick86• 13 years ago

The problem here is inherent with anything that can be fairly characterized as "prosecutorial discretion." Human editing is going to be inherently biased, and it's unfortunate to see a move away from the use of clever algorithm hacks as the preferred way to achieve clean results. You'll find no argument from me against SEO tricks being punished... but taking shortcuts will just result in favoritism at one point or another.

fuckpig• 13 years ago

"Don't be evil." Well, at least until you become a monopolist. Then go right ahead.

bdcravens2• 13 years ago

So everyone talks about RG being superior due to its annotation. (true) But doesn't this identify that 80% of it's traffic comes from "m-low dogg gangsta money freaks and junk lyrics" searches? So at maximum, 20% of users use annotation features (surely some still use it for purely lyrics simply due to it being it easy to remember)

chatmasta• 13 years ago

That's ignoring the presumably large contingent of users including myself and other commenters here who use Google as a direct line to search Rapgenius, like "Rapgenius Kendrick Lamar swimming pools," as it's faster than going to Rapgenius itself.

You could get more accurate numbers by looking at at percent of search traffic to Rapgenius does not include the keyword "Rapgenius" (though you can't do that anymore since google now scrubs SERP referrers).

Rap Genius Traffic Has Dropped By Over 80%

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