Rickrolling
From Chan Top List, the imageboard wiki.
Rickrolling is a bait-and-switch internet prank in which an apparently relevant hyperlink instead leads to the music video for English singer Rick Astley's 1987 song 'Never Gonna Give You Up'. The prank originated on 4chan's /v/ board in 2007 as a variation on an earlier 'duckroll' joke and became one of the most widely recognized internet memes of the late 2000s.
Origin
The earlier 'duckroll' meme replaced anticipated images with a picture of a duck on wheels. Rickrolling adapted the same bait-and-switch structure but used a video link instead of an image, taking advantage of YouTube's then-novel embedding behavior.
Mainstream crossover
Rickrolling crossed into mainstream awareness in 2008, with high-profile incidents including a YouTube April Fools' joke that rickrolled every featured video and a live performance by Astley himself at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Astley has spoken positively about the meme's effect on his career.
External links
See also
- /b/ — 4chan's original 'random' board, the chaotic engine room of the early imageboard internet.
- 4chan — English-language imageboard founded in 2003, modeled on Japan's Futaba Channel. One of the most influential sites in internet culture.
- Lolcats and Image Macros — Cat photos with overlaid captions in broken English; the format that established image macros as the dominant meme genre of the 2000s.
This page was last updated on April 29, 2026.