Mahbod Moghadam, Co-founder of Genius, Passes Away
Mahbod Moghadam, the controversial and always intriguing co-founder of Genius and Everipedia, as well as an angel investor, passed away last month at the age of 41 due to “complications from a recurring brain tumor,” according to a statement attributed to his family and published on Genius.
The startup community recently learned of his passing, with numerous tributes emerging on various platforms. Former TechCrunch writer-turned-investor Josh Constine, who once interviewed Moghadam and his co-founders at Genius when the company was known as Rap Genius, penned a tribute, describing Moghadam as “a complex, edgy, and sometimes controversial figure, but also genuinely funny, brilliant, and always unique.”
Moghadam had been residing in Los Angeles, where he spent approximately 20 months with the venture firm Mucker Capital as an entrepreneur in residence. During this time, he was focused on exploring ways to empower creators to receive more direct compensation for their work.
One of his recent projects was HellaDoge, a short-lived social media platform that rewarded users with dogecoin for sharing dogecoin-related content. Unlike platforms like Facebook or Twitter that generate revenue through ads, HellaDoge aimed to directly compensate its users for their contributions.
In a conversation 11 months ago with According 2 Hip Hop, Moghadam discussed a similar concept for a company called Communistagram, where creators would be paid directly for their content, bypassing traditional platforms like Spotify or YouTube.
Moghadam’s interest in equitable compensation for creators traces back to 2009. After graduating from Yale and Stanford Law School, he entered the legal profession amid the 2008 financial crisis. Following his departure from his first law job, Moghadam co-founded Rap Genius with two Yale friends, Ilan Zechory and Tom Lehman.
Initially focusing on annotating and explaining hip-hop lyrics, Rap Genius grew in popularity, attracting rappers to the platform to explain their own lyrics and correct misconceptions. Notably, rapper Nas became an advisor and one of the platform’s early investors.
