skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
So, the only reason RG in the first place was able to provide lyrics with no spam at no costs is because they were riding on VC money. Other lyrics sites have to make money somehow. But then you might say -- well, what does that matter to the audience? The answer is, usually the spam-free groovy train usually does eventually come to an end. Sites can go on for long periods of time serving straight up spam/ad-free content, but that always ends. Who knew what RG was intending to do after this ended? Would they have gone the Facebook route of datamining the hell out of Biebers fan to advertise them shit they don't need?

One last thing to keep in mind: Rapgenius was an unlicensed lyric site. They weren't playing ball on either side of the fence. Let's hope that a lyric site emerges that provides lyrics with at least acceptable, non-distracting ads, and serves licensed content. I really think merely going by this strategy will get you ranked high on Google.
Let's not feel sorry for these guys just because they were part of YC. They were taking part in black-hat practices, which were clearly in breach of Google's ToS. I expect this penalty to expire eventually, but let this be a lesson to anyone else thinking about doing the same.
As most of my daily tasks are being done in J2EE environment, I have goosebumps each time I hear "java" & "framework" used in one sentence. And that's not excitement, that's fear.

The only framework which I can recommend, is Dropwizard (http://dropwizard.codahale.com/), which tries not to be a framework, just a glue between some really nice libraries and tools.
Very bizarre line of thinking when you put blame on the HN poster and not Rap Genius for doing all kinds of black hat SEO.
it looks like they might have stopped showing "rapgenius.com" in non site-specific results. Searching for "rap genius eminem lose yourself" doesn't give any results in the top 5 pages. The only time I can see results from them is by adding a "site:" modifier to the search.

I think you're right, that depending on how long this lasts, they could be in a world of hurt.
The 3D Bundle — A bundle of Vray 3ds Max scenes with all source files included
Such as linking back to the main song page with an anchor replacing the second part of the URL, similar to Gist links with #L31-style line number links?
I'm shocked to see that their previous fairly good ranking has been fraudulent all along.
Try this:

[bieber heartbreaker lyrics rap genius]
or even
[bieber heartbreaker lyrics rapgenius.com]
A Christmas Wish List for the Internet
But what about the links on the left titled "Recommended Sites", they list pretty much identical websites.
Stop using product features as your value proposition
Go for Guice if you just want DI. You won't regret it. But always remember, all "auto" stuff might mislead you. For example, you need somebody to start things for you, so in Spring, the Servlet container will invoke the Spring Servlet, which will take things up from there. That's the catch, it's not magic, right? So with Guice, you need to figure out who will so that "auto" for you. Btw, if you're just building a small library, Guice is definitely the DI choice. HTH.
4 apps, one weekend
So, my question which I have long windedly led you to is - how would you approach someone on this topic with the intention of persuading them that judgment is really irrelevant to any situation you are in, especially if you are judging people less well off than yourself.

Like any disagreement, I don't know what I'll say in advance, because it's such a situational on-the-fly decision. I know my limited chunk of understanding on the issues and where I stand on them, that's all the preparation I need. Using that I can keep the conversation going instead of reciting prepared talking points. Especially not talking points from the Internet I don't fully comprehend but am are assured are right. Even if I don't change someone's mind in the slightest, I'd rather talk over the issue and understand a perspective I don't agree with instead of showing off just how right I am.
The hack in picture 1 has semi-circular magnets. If you use two magnets with opposite polarities then you can get it to be able to lock in only one position. Also, easy enough to make "wavy" mating surfaces to avoid rotation.
The person that posted it should be a complete opportunist about the matter and put it on their resume and apply to Google or something.It would be even funnier if they offered publicly to be a paid consultant for rap genius.
9 Important Stories That Happened In 2013 That Most People Aren’t Talking About
great stuff. did u notice difference between FB features and GOOGLE+?
counterpoint: growing up != performing life-taking tasks like laundry.
I wonder how many "legitimate" links a site like RapGenius gets. I've never seen anybody link to them, except maybe in social networks. Similar for the stackexchange sites. Sometimes people link to good questions from blogs, but a large portion of links are probably from other stackexchange sites, twitter, and Jeff Atwood's blog (which is a marvel of SEO and affilate marketing in itself).

For many of these high quality content silos (for lack of a better word), the PageRank paradigm seems pretty broken. People don't feel compelled to link to well-known sites precisely because they are well-ranked. And when they do, it is in form of viral posts in social networks, which is not really a great input to determine site quality.

I wouldn't be surprized if Google's real secret algorithm nowadays consists of millions of special cases maintained by thousands of poorly paid interns.
More like... when your entire business is built on google rankings maybe you should consider reading their rules. Closely.

This is a case of Rap Genius brazenly breaking the rules and thinking they can get away with it because of their gilded connections (their spoiled frat boy persona seems to reflect the reality of their behaviour: thinking they're too rich and connected for the rules to apply).

Acting like a clown, like Donald Trump, definitely gets you money and exposure. But personally I wouldn't take any amount of money if it meant I became a person making public rape jokes, making startup culture even more sexist, regressive, pathetic... not to mention racist. Their tongue-in-cheek appropriation of black english is mocking both the rap community as well as the poor black AND white communities that actually use that language for serious (and have no chance of going to elite schools let alone getting a half decent education).

Anyway Rap Genius is a nice service (and I'm a fan of hip hop) but the behavior of the founders is disgusting. Shameful behavior does not suddenly become cool just because it can make you a hundred million dollars. Capitalists always sell away their values eventually. It's sick.

Know what's cooler than a billion dollars? Being a decent human being.
Can someone explain to me why Google is formalizing this against Rap Genius?

I really like their n-gram viewer of the New York Times wedding announcements. http://blog.visual.ly/rap-genius-new-project-visualizes-30-y...

I would be interested in learning what they have to say about NLP (Natural Language Processing) since they deal with language which is quite vernacular.
5th page for "rapgenius"

There are two lessons here: (1) don't do shady shit, (2) Google should only be one of many sources of traffic.
Wow! Just checked and they ranked 59th for "rap genius" and 51st for "rapgenius" on google.
Failing to intervene when a contributor's usefulness starts to wane is a failure of management.
The Amish do not have multi-generational prison sentences for disobedience, you just get asked to leave.

North Korea is not some peasant utopia that just wants to be left alone, it is a nuclear armed totalitarian state that constantly prepares its citizenry for a ficticious total war.

As for your self titling of we amerifats are just convinced we have it better, well, this belies a core truth, many people suspect you might well have it better simply by so many people in your culture being able to get so fat.

There is a massive difference from a society trying to live simply and one in abject poverty due to mismanagement by a series of crazed mass murderers.
Rosetta Code proved very useful in an experiment to see how typos affect code written in various programming languages http://www.spinellis.gr/blog/20121205/.
I can't imagine that this is permanent. Rap Genius is actually one of the most high quality lyrics sites out there, not another spam farm. So removing them for good actually reduces the quality of Google's search results.

I do suspect that because of the attention this once case received, and since Matt Cutts was personally looking into the company's SEO tactics (talk about bad luck), they issued a public, but temporary, slap. That would serve as an eye opener to Rap Genius about how dangerously they're playing the SEO game and a warning to everyone else tuning in.
I would also speculate that many of these projects are subject to horrendous scope creep where accounting systems are being used for far more than just accounting needs. These additional requirements need to be evaluated and excluded from accounting and auditing systems if they are beyond the scope of such systems. Instead they should be rolled into other systems that have a narrower scope.

For example, the posted article states:

"while an impenetrable tangle of logistics and personnel systems
can hinder commanders’ ability to know who and what are
available for deployment."

That to me sounds like scope creep. Yes, commanders need that capability, but that is not a feature that should be part of an accounting and auditing system. Of course these is somewhat relationship between a soldier being paid his wages and being available for deployment, but that is a weak relationship that is best handle via a public API for each system that other specialized defense systems can consume.

I would posit that the contracting approach does nothing to prevent scope creep since most contractors participating in this system are glad to let things keep snowballing because it means more billable hours.
Taschen has a nice reprint available: http://www.amazon.com/Oliver-Byrne-Six-Books-Euclid/dp/38365...
> I get that a lot of companies still rely on Windows, but aren't we slowly edging away from really needing it?

But it's not Windows. It's a new OS that borrows a lot from an older version of Windows as far as design goes, and hopefully brings something new to the table.

And I don't really see how "needing it" or not matters. People use an OS they like, or an OS that has the features they enjoy, or an OS that is compatible with the software they use, or whatever.

> Especially when more and more software is being written in platform-agnostic languages like Java?

Really? Software has always been written in a variety of platform-agnostic languages. C and C++, to name a couple. But I see a recent trend of ignoring and dismissing portability beyond a select few favorite platforms.
To be blunt, this is fairly useless advice. Awareness is important because this leads to support groups and official mechanisms to handle bullying. It also removes stigma.
What they provided wasn't exactly 'proof'. Without any conclusive ground they accused other lyrics sites. Linking to Open Site Explorer and saying they they think some links might be suspicious hardly counts as proof, IMO.
Besides, now that the matter has been brought under Google's attention, they'll of course penalize the other lyric sites too, if any violation is found. But in case of RG, it was all out in the open and I think that's why action was quick.
"The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all."

- H.L. Mencken
Glide Ride Country Song
Songwriter responds to critics of country music that is always the same and too much like pop.
> Personally I used to browse between channels on the telly to get super grainy glimpses of porn. When that wasn't available and after our phone got blocked from calling hotlines, I would simply draw naked women for myself to look at.

You can't see a difference between grainy glimpses of softcore porn or hand drawn images, and high definition easily available images of heavy duty porn?
It doesn't matter that they had the best experience and content because Google was forced to do this to set an example and show that they aren't playing favorites. Imagine other companies who will start testing more black hat strategies with the expectation that it's okay as long as they believe they're better than sites ranking higher than them.
You can force that with diametrically magnetized discs[1]. It's not the usual way these discs are magnetized, but this will not allow rotation under light forces. On the other hand, if you manage to rotate them 90 degrees, they will pop out, as the magnets will start to repel.

With big discs, the force needed to rotate even axial magnetized discs (like the ones they seem to use) is not trivial if the magnet surfaces are clean. By the size of the discs they use, their adhesive force can be ~3-5 kg, and it's not easy to rotate such magnets. You can add a layer of thin cloth over the magnets to increase the friction, and it will also protect the magnets from scratching and damp the hits when sticking.

No idea what kind of magnets they use, but treating them like they do in the presentation (throwing them one against another, or against objects) is a sure way to crack the nickel plating in the long run.

[1] like this one: http://www.supermagnete.de/eng/data_sheet_S-12-06-DN.pdf
Actually youporn, rewrote all their code in PHP:

http://highscalability.com/blog/2012/4/2/youporn-targeting-2...
In my experience, "unprofessional" is synonimous with "honest", but "professional" has several different meanings, "pathological liar" is just one of them.
Great recommendation

Here's the site.

http://www.nand2tetris.org/
Said like a well-entrenched member of the machine...

Bullying victims tend to be victims because they're unable to fight back. Bullies have power, whether it's physical, political, social, or otherwise, and they know it and hide behind it.

Awareness campaigns seek to remove their power, and they are generally very effective. Bullies operate on the basis of isolating their victims, and bystanders that refuse to stand aside (physically, or by calling out the bully for what he or she is) prevent that isolation, giving the victim power of their own.
How does wanting to make a Windows-like OS have anything at all to do with the NSA?
hi, responding to this as a u.s. consumer who is planning to purchase a new bed system in the next two weeks. am replacing a failing king size coil mat with a queen futon system. i have tried lots of beds, and in the past my best sleep and least amount of pain happened with futons or even quilts on a carpeted floor. thick mat is not necessarily better and in fact is probably worse in the long run for the spine. there are indeed futons in the 2000 to 3000 price range; check with the popular chain the futon shop just for starters. small companies making futons of wool, latex etc get into that price point quite often. anyway, hope this helps.
This just makes Google less useful. RG had the best lyrics and annotations for lots of songs. Now Google sends me to barely-readable sites that only exist to show as many ads as possible per page, even if I include "rap genius" in the search.
Yes, you can force that with magnets designed for that, but these appear not to be magnetised like that, so if you want to avoid the rotation, you need to do something about it.

As I say in my other comment, easy enough to do with non-symmetrical mating surfaces.
This would make sense if cryptography was a young field, but this iteration and improvement has been going on for thousands of years (and modern digital cryptography has been developing for the better half of a century). It is known how to implement cryptography securely. Just as you would expect bridges built today to stay up, and doctors working today to be properly trained, you should expect cryptography implementations to be sensible and secure, or at least not try to carve a new, experimental path when people's lives are potentially at stake.
These guys will never grow up
Seems pretty cool! Would this work with Sublime Text 3 too?
Its also sad thay they went about it in such a stupid, stupid way.

They could have built a nice "Link to your favorite lyrics" widget for people to include in their "homepages". Make the appearance customizable, jumble the HTML, and include some stock bla bla to make it "individual" and to appeal to google.

Then announce a competition. We'll showcase the best homepages that link to our lyrics in the most creative way. Maybe give away some silly prizes. Completely legal, nothing for Google to complain about, but gives you the same effect very cleverly.

Instead they did this brazen crap... makes them look very amateurish. Technically not very different, but the tone is completely different, and Google had no choice but to penalize it.
It makes sense that a site needs business model to be sustainable, but Rap Genius is still searching for or developing their model. It does not appear to be based on displaying ads alongside lyrics, and that also is not the main point of their site.

Rap Genius was originally called Rap Exegesis, and while it has a lot of rap lyrics it is a community supported text annotation site, with an ambition far beyond a lyric repository. They have a great deal of content beyond rap, or even lyrics in general. They have poetry and literature, announcements, and press releases (I'd love to see them make a Rap Genius page of Ulysses with the contents of Ulysses Annotated). They have a platform and are building a community. That's why it's attractive to VCs, and that's why it's something beyond the eyesores one mostly lands on searching for lyrics.
As a fellow former 12-year-old boy, I agree that shielding children from legal sexual images doesn't usually serve a purpose other than to deprive them of an education.

We wouldn't restrict kids' access to math materials, then expect them to know calculus as adults. Similarly, kids who are banned from talking about and seeing sexual content can't be expected to understand sexual health.

From an objective standpoint, the interesting question is whether or not exposure to sexual content at early ages is harmful to children. I did some cursory research on this in college and found that:

a) There seems to a big problem with bias in studies concerning sex and adolescents. Even some of the most frequently cited studies use biased language (e.g. abstracts with the phrase "the problem of children viewing sex").

b) A major variable is whether or not parents are there to mediate the kids' exposure to sexual content — not just to restrict their access, but to provide context. To use the math analogy again, it's like the difference between explaining a chapter or dumping worksheets and a textbook on the table.
Merry Christmas 2013
>> "Wow. How can they claim copyright on that? Wasn't the video made by Snowden himself? It certainly seemed like a video taken with a phone (480p recording, too)."

The fact they Channel 4 were the only ones to show it and it was for their alternative Christmas message suggests they had some sort of exclusive on it.
Yup. looking at a cross-platform perspective, FB features gain x2-x3 retention rates than G+, but G+ is getting there on Android..
It's a pyrrhic victory. Now, the best lyrics site can't be found and Google itself is less useful for it.

At least https://duckduckgo.com/?q=it+was+a+good+day+rapgenius seems to work fine.
That just proves how google search algorithms become inaccurate. I agree, RapGenius did some shady things, BUT it still has a better content then other websites which are now ranked much higher.
We always talk about not building a business on someone else's API... Funnily enough, you could almost say that applies here. Gone from any SERPS, entirely. Crazy. I dislike that Google has this much power sometimes :(
With what do you kill the undead? A wooden spike.
Good one. Going to try it for sure.
HN Bug: Case sensitive login
"<song name> site:rapgenius.com" should help.
Why poorly paid?
Personally, not particularly. Sure they're different, but it's not for the government to decide that they should be blocked, especially if it's legal for a portion of the populace to view them.

If a parent doesn't want a child to view material of that nature (or any nature) it should be up to the parent, not the state, to make sure their child doesn't view it or have access to it. There's commercially available software out there that can make the same blocks, but it's opt-in.

The issue isn't that "kids should be able to see what kids want to see", it's "the state shouldn't dictate people can or can't see in the privacy of their home".
They seem to be using Quantcast and are directly measured. This should be interesting over the next week.

https://www.quantcast.com/rapgenius.com
Can't you implement a custom CharSequence for this where and when you need it?
A tiny number of people use proxies or vpns or somesuch. Other than those people:

How are you keeping your internet habits secret from your internet service provider?

> "I want to look at…"

...all the perfectly normal non-porn content that has been blocked by your piss-poor filters. Like that politician's website, for example.
I don't think it was. I think this is a huge penalty, not a correction.
Other than the new generational GC, I'm most excited about String#scrub and String#freeze.

String#scrub:
https://github.com/ruby/ruby/blob/1e8a05c1dfee94db9b6b825097...

String#freeze example:

https://github.com/rails/rails/pull/12879
RG shows ads.
We should start the same kind of campaign to add these kind of links to the bad lyrics sites. Maybe Google will penalize them too.

Btw., duckduckgo still shows rapgenius on top.
I really hate how one search engine can make or break a site.

We live in the AOL dark ages and most don't even realize it.
No, TheLoneWolfling's idea can't be implemented with weak references with finalizers. Firstly, finalizers only run after weak references are cleared (i think - please correct me if i'm wrong!). Secondly, he needs GC to trigger code that mutates the no-longer-referring object; the finalizer runs in the no-longer-referred-to object.

He's right that a new VM-level hook would be required to implement his idea. The benefits don't clearly justify making a change of that magnitude.
Definitely amateurish. I shuddered a bit at the language used in their reply e-mail for the affiliate program. It's nearly condescending and, and...well, you get it.

(http://searchengineland.com/google-is-looking-into-rap-geniu...)
Telegram developer here,

Thanks for all the free advice. It's much more effective to develop expertise in house then pay for engineers thanks to forums like this.
According to alexa their top 10 traffic sources are:

google.com - 35.7%; youtube.com - 4.4%; google.co.uk - 4.0%; facebook.com - 3.9%; google.de - 3.5%; google.ca - 3.1%; google.co.in - 2.6%; google.fr - 2.5%; google.com.tr - 1.5%; google.es - 1.1%;

Except for facebook all it top sources are Google owned(58.4%). This will truly be disasterous for their revenues.

Considering they rank 59th for "rap genius" and 51st for "rapgenius" on Google.

There are tons of lessons to be learned here. Don't depend on a single source for traffic and most of all don't excessively try gaming the system, the system usually catches up.