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rickroll

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
See also: Rickroll and rick-roll

English

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WOTD – 6 February 2023

Etymology

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Rick Astley (center) after rickrolling the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade (sense 2.1) by unexpectedly appearing on the Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends float and performing his hit song “Never Gonna Give You Up” on November 27, 2008.
Example

This link is definitely not a rickroll.

The verb is a blend of Rick +‎ duckroll, combining the name of the British pop singer and songwriter Rick Astley (born 1966) with a reference to the duckroll prank on the website 4chan, in which users tricked into clicking on a hyperlink were led to an image of a duck on wheels. The word was coined by the American YouTuber Shawn Cotter (born 1987) who, under the handle “cotter548”, uploaded the music video of Astley’s song “Never Gonna Give You Up” (1987) to the online video-sharing service YouTube and then posted messages on 4chan on May 15, 2007 ostensibly with links to a trailer for the forthcoming game Grand Theft Auto IV. People who clicked on the links instead saw the Astley video with the caption “You just got Rickroll’d” scrolling across the screen.[1] The noun is derived from the verb.

Pronunciation

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Verb

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rickroll (third-person singular simple present rickrolls, present participle rickrolling, simple past and past participle rickrolled) (transitive)

  1. (originally Internet slang) To mislead (someone) into following a seemingly innocuous hyperlink, or sometimes a QR code, that leads to a YouTube video of Rick Astley's song "Never Gonna Give You Up".
    I try not to get rickrolled by sketchy YouTube links, but sometimes you let your guard down.
    • 2008 April 1, Jenna Wortham, “YouTube ‘Rickrolls’ Everyone”, in Wired‎[2], San Francisco, Calif.: Condé Nast Publications, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 7 August 2020:
      YouTube ‘Rickrolls’ Everyone [title] […] Let the Internet pranking begin! YouTube, capitalizing on the resurgence of a popular meme, has booby-trapped each of the “featured videos” on its homepage. Click on any of the showcased clips and you’ll be taken instead to a cheesy video of pop singer Rick Astley singing his late-’80s hit song, “Never Gonna Give You Up.”
    • 2008 December 5, Charles Arthur, “Why rickrolling is bad for you”, in Alan Rusbridger, editor, The Guardian‎[3], London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 22 October 2022:
      Once you start rickrolling people, and more importantly get a reputation for it, you're heading towards being the Zimbabwean dollar in the link economy: it doesn't matter how many you offer, people just aren't going to buy them.
    • 2016 April 20, Homa Khaleeli, “How Vote Leave got rickrolled”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian‎[4], London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 17 November 2022:
      Despite its name, there is one thing the Vote Leave campaign should not have left for so long: registering a domain name. The delay by the anti-EU organisation meant that up to 100,000 people who tried to access voteleave.com, co.uk or .net were rickrolled – redirected to a YouTube clip of Rick Astley's 1987 hit Never Gonna Give You Up. So far, so internet.
    • 2020, David Pogue, “The Internet Celebrity Culture [Internet Memes 101: A Guide to Online Wackiness]”, in Social Media Influencers: Apps, Algorithms and Celebrities (In the Headlines), New York, N.Y.: New York Times Educational Publishing in association with The Rosen Publishing Group, →ISBN, page 14:
      You send a Web link to someone, promising something exciting or compelling ("Is this you!?")—but the link actually takes your victim to a YouTube video of Rick Astley's 1987 music video, "Never Gonna Give You Up." That's it. That's the joke. Ha! You've been Rickrolled!
  2. (by extension)
    1. To surprise or trick (someone) into hearing this song.
      The DJ rickrolled the whole audience by suddenly playing Rick Astley’s hit song.
      • 2014 July 16, Andy Greenberg, “Rickroll Innocent Televisions With This Google Chromecast Hack”, in Wired‎[5], archived from the original on 2022-11-27:
        With a single tap on its screen, the device can take over any one of the millions of televisions connected to a Google Chromecast digital media player that happens to be within Wi-Fi range and force it to play Astley's canonical “Never Gonna Give You Up” music video—or any other equally annoying or embarrassing YouTube clip of the prankster’s choosing. […] But [Dan] Petro nonetheless imagines a rickmote-wielding hacker moving slowly through around a dense residential area and wirelessly rickrolling one hapless Chromecast owner after another.
      • 2014 November 26, Tim Donnelly, “10 historic moments from Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade”, in New York Post‎[6], New York, N.Y.: News Corp, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 19 May 2022:
        In 2008, Astley proved he was a good sport about the joke, interrupting a song on the float for "Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends" to Rickroll the parade.
      • 2017 April, Chloe Neill, “Scales of Justice”, in Blade Bound (A Chicagoland Vampires Novel; 13), New York, N.Y.: Berkley Books, →ISBN, page 286:
        She paused, blinked, then looked at me. "Did you Rick-Roll me?"
      • 2020, Lowen Wuulph, “Roadtrip [12-28 & 29-2006]”, in The Dirac Effect, Pittsburgh, Pa.: Dorrance Publishing Company, →ISBN, page 200:
        He turned on the radio. An oldies station from Phoenix was in the middle of playing Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up”. / “Oh my God!” Harlowe screamed and laughed. “Did Phoenix just ‘Rick Roll’ us?”
      • 2021 October 18, Amy Woodyatt, “Greta Thunberg ‘Rickrolls’ climate concert with crazy dance moves”, in CNN‎[7], archived from the original on 17 October 2022:
        Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg has "Rickrolled" an audience, all in the name of climate activism. Thunberg danced to Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up" on Saturday, in front of a crowd at Climate Live, a youth-led concert for climate action.
    2. To cause (someone) to unexpectedly engage with this song through an indirect method, such as through steganography, sheet music, or by inserting the lyrics into an unrelated context.
      She inserted the lyrics of “Never Gonna Give You Up” into her speech so casually that most listeners didn’t even realize they’d been rickrolled.
      • 2009 September 14, Brett Israel, “Never Gonna Give You Up: MIT Gets RickRolled”, in Discover: Science for the Curious‎[8], Waukesha, Wis.: Kalmbach Publishing, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-11-27:
        For their latest hack, students decided to RickRoll the Dome in the nerdiest way possible—by wrapping the first eight notes of the now infamous pop song around it's exterior.
      • 2011 April 13, Eyder Peralta, “Rickrolled: Or How One Politician Overcame Partisan Divide to Pull a Prank”, in All Things Considered, NPR‎[9], archived from the original on 2022-11-27:
        Yesterday, Korva pointed to an amusing video of lawmakers Rickrolling the Oregon State House. […] So what Oregon lawmakers did was include snippets of the song's lyrics into their speeches on the House floor and then stich it together to make the tune.
      • 2014 January 17, Tom Gardner, “Rickrolled: Student pranks his physics teacher by inserting lyrics to Rick Astley’s ‘Never Going to Give You Up’ into paper on quantum mechanics”, in Daily Mail‎[10], London: DMG Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-11-27:
        Sairam Gudiseva’s boast on Twitter that he had ‘Rick Rolled my physics teacher …’', posting an accompanying photograph of his essay with the verse from the 1987 hit ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’ written with the first word on every line.
      • 2016 July 19, Randall Roberts, “Melania Trump’s RNC speech provokes claims of plagiarism and, maybe worse, Rickrolling”, in Los Angeles Times‎[11], Los Angeles, Calif.: Los Angeles Times Communications, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-11-27:
        Specifically, one passage from [Melania] Trump's inspiring address bears a striking resemblance to Astley's song, which had led to accusations that the Trump campaign may be "Rick-rolling" the electorate.

Alternative forms

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Derived terms

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Translations

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Noun

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rickroll (plural rickrolls)

  1. (Internet slang) An act of or attempt at rickrolling.
    You have to check out this link. Not a rickroll.
    • 2008 December 5, Charles Arthur, “Why rickrolling is bad for you”, in Alan Rusbridger, editor, The Guardian‎[12], London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 22 October 2022:
      Now, I know that the the[sic] problem with what I'm saying is that it sounds like a recipe for being really boring and humdrum. Links, links, links. I'm not really; the rickroll has a value, to spike peoples' inflated expectations, or remind them—wittily—of their weaknesses: […]
    • 2009, Greg Jarboe, “Month 3: Create Viral Video Content”, in YouTube and Video Marketing: An Hour a Day, Indianapolis, Ind.: Wiley Publishing, →ISBN, page 161:
      Chances are that at some point in 2008, you or someone you know experienced a "Rick Roll"—a bait-and-switch prank that dupes you into watching the video for Rick Astley's 1980s hit "Never Gonna Give You Up." […] But perhaps the ultimate Rick Roll occurred on April Fool's Day in 2008, when YouTube rigged up every feature video on the home page to play Astley's infamous clip.
    • 2009 April 30, Rick Astley, “moot [i.e., Christopher Poole]”, in Time‎[13], New York, N.Y.: Time Warner Publishing, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 25 May 2022:
      I find some Rickrolls really funny. Have you seen the one with President Barack Obama? Someone has cut up his speeches and put them together so that he sings "Never Gonna Give You Up." It's totally amazing. I find it bonkers, by the way!
    • 2013, Austen Kay, “Teenage Kicks”, in Simon Pont, editor, Digital State: How the Internet is Changing Everything, London, Philadelphia, Pa.: Kogan Page, →ISBN, page 74:
      Now 4chan is the largest active forum in the United States. […] It's the originator of countless memes, including Lolcats and my personal favourite, Rickrolls.
    • 2016 September 16, Louis Nelson, “Jake Tapper Calls Trump Event a ‘Political Rick-roll’”, in Politico‎[14], archived from the original on 25 June 2022:
      CNN anchor Jake Tapper called Donald Trump's decision to trot out an array of military medal winners before addressing his long-held questions about President Barack Obama's birth a "political Rick-roll." […] "While these American heroes are, you know, people that we should all show reverence and respect, they are much greater men than Rick Astley, it’s hard to imagine this as anything other than a political Rick-roll," Tapper said.
    • 2017, Anton Nijholt, “Mischief Humor in Smart and Playable Cities”, in Anton Nijholt, editor, Playable Cities: The City as a Digital Playground (Gaming Media and Social Effects), Singapore: Springer Nature, →DOI, →ISBN, →ISSN, part III (Design for Playful Public Spaces), page 242:
      In the Internet world and in multiplayer videogames in particular, to play a hoax on someone is also called trolling. […] One well-known tactic is the ‘rick roll’ meme, wherein someone is led to believe that a certain action, for example, clicking a particular hyperlink, will be relevant to his aims but instead the victim is unintentionally directed to a music video for the 1987 song "Never Gonna Give You Up" by Rick Astley.
    • 2018 October, Sean Au, Thomas Power, “A Bit of Coin Theory”, in Tokenomics: The Crypto Shift of Blockchains, ICOs, and Tokens (Expert Insight), Birmingham, West Midlands: Packt Publishing, →ISBN, page 47:
      An image of [Nelson] Mandela, the bitcoin logo, Rickrolls, emails from [Satoshi] Nakamoto, and even Valentine's Day messages have all been found on the blockchain […].
    • 2020, William O’Sullivan, Kim-Kwang Raymond Choo, Nhien-An Le-Khac, “Defending IoT [Internet of Things] Devices from Malware”, in Nhien-An Le-Khac, Kim-Kwang Raymond Choo, editors, Cyber and Digital Forensic Investigation: A Law Enforcement Practitioner’s Perspective (Studies in Big Data; 74), Cham, Switzerland: Springer Nature, →DOI, →ISBN, →ISSN, page 10:
      This seems much more likely to be the work of a talented but inexperienced individual. […] The rick-roll in the code seems juvenile and unprofessional.

Alternative forms

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Translations

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References

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  1. ^ Jessica Roy (2012 September 5) “Meet Shawn Cotter, the Man behind the Rickroll”, in Observer‎[1], archived from the original on 19 November 2022.

Further reading

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