Genius (company)

Genius
Type of businessPrivate
Type of site
Media company
HeadquartersBrooklyn, New York City[1],
U.S.
Area servedWorldwide
OwnerMediaLab AI, Inc.[2]
Founder(s)
President
  • Ilan Zechory (former)
  • Miki Toliver King (current)
CEOTom Lehman[3]
IndustryEntertainment
URLgenius.com
RegistrationRequired for editing, annotating, and transcribing
LaunchedOctober 20, 2009; 15 years ago (2009-10-20)[4] (as Rap Genius)
Written in

Genius is an American digital media company founded on August 27, 2009, by Tom Lehman, Ilan Zechory, and Mahbod Moghadam. Its website serves as an online music encyclopedia allowing users to provide annotations and interpretation to song lyrics, news stories, sources, poetry, and documents.

Originally launched as Rap Genius, with a focus on hip-hop music, the company attracted the attention and support of celebrities, and venture capital enabling further growth.[1] The site expanded in 2014 to cover other forms of media, such as pop, literature, and R&B, and added an annotation-embedded platform. That same year, an iPhone app was released. To reflect these new goals, the site relaunched as Genius in July 2014. An Android version was released in August 2015,[5] and in 2016 and 2017, the company began producing music-focused original video content and hosting live events and concerts.

  1. ^ a b Wiedeman, Reeves (January 4, 2015). "Genius Idea". New York. Archived from the original on July 5, 2017.
  2. ^ "Brands | MediaLab". medialab.la. Retrieved June 7, 2023.
  3. ^ Connor, Jackson (January 12, 2016). "Genius: The Annotation Will Not Be Televised". The Village Voice. Archived from the original on November 7, 2017.
  4. ^ "RapGenius.com WHOIS, DNS, & Domain Info – DomainTools". WHOIS. Archived from the original on August 4, 2019. Retrieved February 15, 2017.
  5. ^ "XDA Picks: Best Apps of the Week (Aug 1 – Aug 8)". August 8, 2015. Archived from the original on September 6, 2015.