[garrettdreyfus]

I mean no offense, but it is a very futile and somewhat worthless effort to insult a genre of music and to some extent those who listen to it on a site like Hacker News. I would also encourage you to branch out and listen to different kinds of hip hop, for hip hop like any genre is very diverse (some songs don't event have "mindless unintelligible lyrics"). No harsh feelings but stay classy ;)

[soylentcola]

Music is one of those things where it can take a little effort to explore and expand your boundaries. Still, in the end while I personally think that's a worthwhile undertaking, the benefits are personal so all I can do is (like you) encourage others to make the effort. It doesn't really affect me at all if someone else doesn't like [insert genre or style or artist here] but I will say that in my experience, it's almost always a positive thing to get into.

I wrote off broad swaths of musical styles when I was younger because I thought I actually had a clue about what was out there. I wrote off country because I'd only listened to a little bit of country and didn't like it. I wrote off house and trance and a lot of other electronic music because I had heard a bit of that and also didn't like it.

But in both cases, I was lucky enough to be exposed to a wider variety thanks to the internet, streaming radio like Shoutcast, and yeah...even a good bit of unauthorized downloading when I was younger and options for discovery weren't as robust. Now I doubt I could bring myself to write off any broad genre if only because I had to reconsider both times I'd done so in the past.