Is Rickrolling Devaluing Your Social Currency?

from the welcome-to-the-life-of-a-griefer dept

If you're reading this site, you probably know what Rickrolling means. However, did you ever think that people would be discussing how Rickrolling devalues your online currency? Yes, according to the Guardian, it's important to realize that Rickrolling is bad for you. The argument is pretty straightforward. Online, links are a form of "currency." If you provide good links, it increases your value to a community, but if you provide bad links... well then you lose a lot of value. And what kind of link could be worse than one that tricks you into watching a Rick Astley video (don't answer that)? Of course, I would think that's all rather obvious. Being a jerk and tricking people into clicking on bad links isn't likely to gain you many friends... except this ignores the context by which Rickrolling first came to prominence.

When it first came around, it was actually a way of gaining social currency within a specific community, where tricking others was seen as a part of the game. So, yes, in normal, polite company, being a jerk via Rickrolling might get people pissed off at you. And, these days, the meme is so played out that it might just get people to wonder why you're still living in 2007. However, to automatically assume that it "devalues" your social currency ignores the context in which it's used.
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Filed Under: rickrolling, social currency


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  1. identicon
    dragunkat, 11 Dec 2008 @ 3:31am

    cartoon network rick rolled the macy's day parade. granted, they used the real rick astley, but it was still a rick roll.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    Cornettheory, 11 Dec 2008 @ 3:31am

    Well, at least it is a music video. People who have been around the internet block a few times remember when goatse was popular.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Shohat, 11 Dec 2008 @ 3:32am

    Ahem

    A person has gotta have a mighty worthless set of skills to be judged by his /link sharing/online social/ abilities.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    Dav, 11 Dec 2008 @ 3:39am

    Context

    This is very true but the context in which you rickroll is also very important.

    If you were to rickroll in a serious political discssion for instance your community value would decreace.

    If on the other hand you were to rickroll in a joke/spam/pointless discussion then your detriment in value will be minimal. Also if you confine yourself to pulling pranks like this to the pointless/spam then your linking value will only fall in this arena rather then in the more serious discussions.

    Also remember that rickrolling is still amusing when done in the appropriate place and time.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. identicon
    B, 11 Dec 2008 @ 4:02am

    Oh Crap

    I just lost the game

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. identicon
    E, 11 Dec 2008 @ 4:19am

    Aw man!

    So did I!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. identicon
    Ed, 11 Dec 2008 @ 4:24am

    Re: goatse on /.

    I remember my first goatse on /. Same for tubgirl and lemonparty. These were much much much worse than rickrolling. I sorta like the rickroll.

    Anyway, goatse forced /. to put in explicit URL listings next to the link so you could have some clue if it looked legit (assuming you did not check your browser URL preview).

    link to this | view in thread ]

  8. icon
    chris (profile), 11 Dec 2008 @ 4:29am

    Re: Oh Crap

    i accidentally the whole rickroll. is this dangerous?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  9. identicon
    LampLover, 11 Dec 2008 @ 5:09am

    Re: Re: Oh Crap

    It's only dangerous if you don't Love Lamp.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  10. identicon
    Matt, 11 Dec 2008 @ 5:41am

    currency only to those who find value

    Some websites are known to have tech savvy users, and so linking to lemoparty/goatse/rickroll has no effect, in fact it may value that person because of the social value of humor.

    Fark forums, somethingawful forums, are both like that.

    Also, unless someone does this kind of thing constantly, people's memory will tend to be like a goldfish. A single user in a swarm of users tends to not be memorable enough just due to a rickroll.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  11. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 Dec 2008 @ 6:06am

    ZOMG!

    "Well, at least it is a music video. People who have been around the internet block a few times remember when goatse was popular."

    The only thing worse were the 'fan' sites where people did similar things

    link to this | view in thread ]

  12. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 Dec 2008 @ 6:11am

    I've been rickrolled several times. Sometimes it was pretty clever. Sometimes it was utterly obvious. Every time it made me smile.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  13. identicon
    Chuck Norris' Enemy (deceased), 11 Dec 2008 @ 6:32am

    Re: Macy's Day Parade

    I remember watching that with my family...20 or so people. Nobody knew what was going on except me. I explained it, and of course, wasn't too funny to them.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  14. identicon
    Trevlac, 11 Dec 2008 @ 6:39am

    Re: Oh Crap

    GOD
    DAMMIT

    link to this | view in thread ]

  15. identicon
    Trevlac, 11 Dec 2008 @ 6:40am

    Re: Re: Oh Crap

    Dude. You're doing it wrong.

    "I accidentally a is this bad?"

    Not the form I keep seeing: "I accidentally a whole !"

    link to this | view in thread ]

  16. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 Dec 2008 @ 6:43am

    Mike, you're HILARIOUS

    link to this | view in thread ]

  17. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 11 Dec 2008 @ 7:48am

    Re:

    you know, It always surprised me the fame the three big name pictures got (Goatse, Tubgirl, and the Harlequin Fetus used to be referred to collectively as the "unholy trinity") by the same method as the rick astley video got, but now that video is common the really messed up stuff like BME pain Olympics (DON'T LOOK THAT UP IF YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT IT IS!) exists people don't trick others into watching them much the way they did with goatse et all.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  18. identicon
    eball, 11 Dec 2008 @ 8:49am

    "When it first came around, it was actually a way of gaining social currency..."
    Mike, I gotta disagree with you there, simply because the community on which it started is, of course, all anonymous. There's still an odd sort of value, but it doesn't have that value where you decide you will or won't click on links from one particular person.
    But as soon as I read the headline in RSS, I thought of a friend of mine who was very late jumping on the bandwagon. He posted a Myspace bulletin claiming to go to some video, and instead of using an unidentifiable youtube link, it went to rickroll.com. And, of course, Myspace now takes you to a big warning page when you click external links, so... it wasn't the most convincing trick. Point being, he's a friend of mine IRL, but any online interaction we have is greatly devalued now, and I usually ignore the hell out of him. He's a good guy in person, but a total jackass online, and that little "trick" really put me off from seeing what he has to say.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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