(AllHipHop News) Cleveland Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert has not been afraid to spend part of his reported $3.8 billion dollars net worth in recent days. First, he was able to bring LeBron James back to the Cavs with a $42 million deal, and then he invested another $40 million, alongside Andreessen Horowitz, in the “Genius Project” formerly known as Rap Genius.
[ALSO READ: Rap Genius Releases New iPhone App]
Gilbert wrote a blog post titled “I’m Hoping It’s Smart To Invest Genius” explaining why he made the move to back the website with a mission to “annotate the world.”
Read portions of Gilbert’s post below:
Have you heard of a newly released app, web site, business concept or technology and thought to yourself: “Why doesn’t this already exist?” The gap it fills and problem it solves seems so simple and common sense that you start asking yourself: “Why didn’t I think of that?!” That was my response when I first heard of Rap Genius, originally a crowdsourced platform for decoding complex rap lyrics.
For nearly four decades, rap (and hip-hop culture in general) has been one of the most influential music genres of our time. Rap and Hip-Hop have transcended from music into fashion, sports, politics, film and pop culture.
Since its debut in 2009, Rap Genius has caught on in a big way among artists and the public, allowing everyone to dive into the lyrics of hip-hop music to find a deeper and better understanding of the creators’ original intent. In addition, the burgeoning company has entered into licensing partnerships with all of the major music publishers, as well as dozens of smaller ones.
Friday, Rap Genius took their concept to a completely new level by re-launching the platform as ‘Genius’ (genius.com). With a new name and a broader scope, Genius takes a huge step toward fulfilling its mission to crowdsource the annotation of ALL TEXT on the internet (that’s right—the entire web)….
Genius is a place where community and technology combine perfectly to revolutionize the way we read and consume information. I am excited to invest in Genius (through Detroit Venture Partners (DVP)) along with Andreessen Horowitz, among others. I am also looking forward to joining the Board of Directors with Ben Horowitz and the company’s founders, Tom Lehman and Ilan Zechory. From the moment I met them, I knew the creativity and passion of Ilan and Tom, as well as the other team members of Genius, would propel them to build something very special. Sometimes you can ‘feel’ a winner even before they speak a single word.
To read the entire blog post with annotations visit here.