Rickrolling started out as a MySpace-era prank and became one of the first memes to break
into the mainstream.
Our hearts have been aching to tell the story, so here it is.
Rickrolling is a bait-and-switch prank that got its start in 2007 on the internet forum
4chan.
Instead of sending someone an image of a duck with wheels, a user would post misleading
links that would redirect to the music video for Rick Astley's 1987 blue-eyed soul hit,
"Never Gonna Give You Up."
Why?
Well, that requires some explanation.
4chan is an anonymous, image-posting internet forum founded by Christopher Poole in 2003.
Forum members frequently played pranks on each other, and at one point, Poole installed
a word filter that changed every instance of the word "egg" to "duck."
This then changed every instance of the word "eggroll" to the word "duckroll," which forum
users then decided should be represented by a duck with wheels.
This then evolved into a bait-and-switch prank in which people would post links with clickbait-y
titles that would lead everyone clicking them to the duckwheel image.
Then came the trailer for Grand Theft Auto IV, which was so popular that it crashed the
Rockstar Games website in March 2007.
A couple months later, an enterprising 4channer put a video on YouTube pretending to be the
new GTA4 trailer, but instead it was the "Never Gonna Give You Up" video, and thus the Rickroll
was born.
While the phenomenon was brewing on the internet, Rick Astley was completely unaware of it until
he was eventually Rickrolled himself by a friend.
At first, he didn't get it.
He didn't even understand that it was supposed to be a prank at all, and he wasn't sure what
sharing his music in this context even meant.
As the pranks escalated in scale, with members of 4chan's Anonymous activists blasting the
song through boomboxes at Scientology protests, he began to be a bit creeped out by this bizarre
internet thing attached to his song.
"I want to be Rickrolled."
He eventually warmed up to it, though, and by Thanksgiving 2008, he was ready to join
in the fun himself.
On that day, he made a surprise appearance performing the song on the Macy's Thanksgiving
Day Parade float for the Cartoon Network series Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends.
All things considered, the appearance seems to have done more for Astley's career than
the cartoon itself, which was canceled less than a year later.
In order to attract attention to the newly created House of Representatives YouTube channel
in 2009, then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi produced a rather unusual introductory video.
It begins by following a couple of cats milling around in a Capitol office, staring out windows,
messing with things like Pelosi's ceremonial gavel, and getting all over the antique furniture.
But then about thirty seconds into the shenanigans, something happens.
You can probably guess what it is.
Yes, it's true, visitors found themselves Rickrolled by the then-third most powerful
person in America.
Subsequent videos on the channel are distinctly less exciting, and the account seems to have
been abandoned years ago, with only a handful of remaining public videos.
We kind of wonder what those cats are up to now.
With Pelosi having returned to the role of Speaker in 2019, maybe she'll provide us with
an update!
In 2011, Democrat Jefferson Smith, a member of the Oregon House of Representatives, came
up with a bipartisan idea for April Fools' Day.
Oregon lawmakers would introduce pieces of the lyrics of "Never Gonna Give You Up"' in
their speeches on the House floor.
Then, the Oregon State House released a video of these speeches spliced together to recreate
Rick Astley's song.
For anyone worried that this was a waste of government money, Smith made sure to note
that the video editing was performed via volunteer aides, and not on the taxpayer dollar.
However, it did entail on-the-clock cooperation between several Oregon lawmakers on both sides
of the political spectrum.
The challenge was figuring out how to include the lyrics in their speeches without wasting
floor time by deviating from the topic they were speaking on.
As such, some phrases were more difficult than others, and it was hard for others to
not laugh the first time a lawmaker said "never gonna give you up" on the House floor.
In any case, never let anyone tell you that Republicans and Democrats can't compromise.
The Westboro Baptist Church is an example of the uglier side of internet organizing.
Founded by pastor Fred Phelps in 1955, the church has been holding protests against the
LGBT community since at least 1991.
As the years have gone by, the church has since branched out to picketing concerts and
funerals.
A frequent target of their protests is the rock band Foo Fighters, otherwise known as
a group of ridiculously nice and charming guys who wouldn't harm a fly.
Even the band itself isn't entirely sure why they're in Westboro's cross hairs, but they've
never backed down from a chance to troll the trolls back on their own turf.
While performing in Kansas City, Missouri in 2011, they were picketed by Westboro, so
they arranged an entire impromptu concert across the street from the protest.
Then in 2015, the band put together something a bit more intimate.
They were in Kansas City again, and Westboro was protesting again.
The band members pulled up towards the protest in a pickup truck and started blasting "Never
Gonna Give You Up" and then a bunch of Foo fans turned the scene into a Rick Astley dance
party.
It just goes to show that if you're looking to draw attention to yourself, confronting
a rock band probably isn't your best bet.
"Was I the only one that had to look that up in the urban dictionary, Rickroll?"
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