RickRolling: A Web Phenomenon
You turned your PC on. And started surfing the net. After a few clicks you found yourself basking in the funky 8o’s music with a psychedelic blond young man dancing on YouTube. Guess what? You’ve just been Rickrolled!
After more than twenty years since Rick Astley’s "Never Gonna Give You Up" topped the Billboard Hot 100, this idiosyncratic dance music is once again hitting the public consciousness thanks to the phenomenon known as "RickRolling."
Around March 2007, bloggers and online social networkers started this internet hype by linking random items to the song’s nostalgically ’80s music video via YouTube. RickRolling was initiated to psych-out readers who would click on enticing hyperlinks, only to fall prey to a young Astley’s blonde bouffant and characteristic dance moves.