User:MarjoleinStassen/UTC

UNRAVEL THE MEME

For this first project you will take look at particular given memes and analyse them. Formulate your own questions in order to dissect, interpret, assess, the meme. For example: What characterizes your meme? How is it used? How widespread is it? Where did it originate from? What are keywords that you would attach to it? What is it’s effect? What are it’s components? What does it link to? What is your opinion of this meme? How is it transformed? How would you categorize it’s iterations? What story might you want to tell about this meme? And how would you visualize this story? Ultimately your findings will be displayed as a mini-exhibition during the Wereld van Witte de With.

RickRolled

In 1987 Rick Astley was released, making it a solo debut single of the album 'Whenever You Need Somebody'. Later at the 4CHAN community, one of the founders m00t, says that the RickRolling started on the VideoGame board circa May 2007. This all started with the predecessor named 'DuckRoll'. The Duckroll all started because a word filter on the 4CHAN boards turned the word "egg" into "duck". When typing eggroll it would turn into duckroll. Later a picture with a duck on wheels became popular "Duckroll" by send it to a friend or someone who is anticipating something and gets this picture to trick them. Basically getting a duckroll when instead they want to see another picture.

Since the game GTA IV was so anticipated int he year 2007 people started to link Rick Astley's video on the 4CHAN platform disguising it as a sneak preview or trailer for the anticipated game. This is how the RickRoll all started. It is a 'Bait and Switch' type of joke.

"To post a misleading link with a subject that promises to be exciting or interesting, e.g. "World of Starcraft in-game footage!" or "Paris Hilton blows Busta Rhymes' dick" but actually turns out to be the video for Rick Astley's debut single, "Never Gonna Give You Up". A variant on the duckroll. Allegedly hilarious." - Urban Dictionary.

This can happen on Youtube itself, with misleadingly titled videos, or with links from other sites to youtube. These videos usually have a misleading image in the middle of the video, so that the thumbnail on youtube looks legit. Sometime they even make names that seem legit.

Timeline

• 2007 (APRIL/MAY): 4CHAN, DuckRoll.
• 2008: Gaming Scene, GTA IV Sneak Peak Release video is Rick Astley’s music video
• 2008: Youtube uses it as April Fools Joke.
• 2008: NYC Mets uses “Never going to give you up” as 8th inning song, because of popular vote of the people
• 2008: Rick Astley gets to preform his classic song on the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade after 14 years.
• 2008: Rick’s song becomes so popular that he even gets voted for “Best Act Ever” in the MTV European Music Awards.
• 2008: Studies show that in 2008 18 million adult Americans were RickRolled.
• 2010: Lyrics are used by Oregon’s house of Representatives during a House Sessions.
• 2010: WikiLeaks uses lyrics in an article about serious attacks on Visa, MasterCard, Amazon and Paypal
• 2011: The Whitehouse tweets a link, which is actually a link to Rick Astley’s music video.

Popularity

The reason why it became so popular was because it was a way to be part of the joke. The Rickrolling slowly expanded from the Gaming-Scene to more of the mainstream where other anticipated audiences were tricked too. It is also fun to see your friends or known people react to it as a form of Peer-Reaction. This type of jokes have been tormenting the internet from a long time, with not only having the RickRolled as a Bait-and-Switch video there are also others in that same category such as:

• Scary Prank Videos
• Two Girls one Cup (Don't google for your own safety)
• "X Amount of girls online in your neighborhood and want to chat" - Ads
• Fake Close Buttons on Ads
• Fake Outs

Targets

• People Looking for Movie / Game Trailers / Footage
• Abridged Series Watchers
• People who try to watch TV on Youtube