Rickrolling… Huh?

You know you’re starting to get on in years when you notice that the youth (brats?) of today use terms and slang you have absolutely no idea of the meaning of. When the hell did I start getting old? I’m sure it was just last week that I was in some dingy bar slamming tequila by the bucketload.

Oh right, that WAS last week. I’m only 30 – definitely young enough to still have a couple of free passes to some serious liver abuse.

I keep hearing the term rickrolled, and find myself looking at the screen going “Huh?”. Ever the nerd, I figured it was time to find out, and therefore, I figured I’d share it with you.

Because you care.

Yes you do.

Go on, admit it.

There you go.

Yet again, Answers.com saves the day:

Q: What does it mean to be Rickrolled?

A: A rickroll is a prank played on an unsuspecting web surfer. To be rickrolled is when browsing a website (especially a discussion forum or comment board), one comes across a link expecting it to lead to one thing, but finds something completely different when the link is clicked.

The name Rick refers to 80s pop singer Rick Astley. The standard rickroll generally involves someone posting a link claiming it leads to something quite interesting, but actually linking to a video of Mr. Astley singing “Never Gonna Give You Up.” This is usually considered a major let-down.

Kinda like this… Rick Astley – Never gonna give you up. (Stoopid Youtube won’t let me embed the video clip on this post.)

I’m sure old Rick would have something to say about all this!

Actually – he does. Wikipedia had this to add: As the practice has spread, two of the various Rickrolling videos available online have been viewed more than 39 million times combined. These figures track the total number of visits, not individual viewers. Rickrolling has extended beyond Web links to playing the video or song disruptively in other situations, including public places; this culminated when Astley and the song made a surprise appearance in the 2008 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, a televised event with tens of millions of viewers.

Good effort.

And by the way: I DID notice that there is no “G.” option on the image above. Did you? Thought so. Fail.