I admit there’s a certain charm to an AI Rickrolling a human entirely off its own digital back, and I’m willing to suspend disbelief in the hope that maybe this customer service chatbot really did decide to scam the user with an OG meme. As bizarre as that thought might be.
But oh, the sweet memories. I come home from school, dinner is cooking, and I’m browsing the forums. Someone explains why I’m wrong to think that a Frost Death Knight can effectively play DPS by providing a link to a few previous WoW patch notes, a link that I’m invested in enough to click. I expect a wall of text. But there, before me, is a boyish figure clicking his heels and swaying his hips to a hypnotic 80s synth, singing words that teach me the uncomplicated beauty of love and commitment. What a wholesome and innocent game I’ve been played.
Those were the days. Now it seems like AI chatbots could be making a weird comeback, as we see Lindy AIfounder Flo Crivello shows the AI bot apparently responds to a user’s email request with an actual Rickroll, stating, “Lindy is literally f***ing rickrolling our customers.”
The bot, which boasts of being “the world’s easiest way to create AI automation to save time and grow your business,” is seen in a post responding to a user’s request for a how-to video by linking to what it called a “comprehensive video tutorial.” But hidden beneath the hypertext of the link, in a tale as ancient as time, was a link to Rick Astley’s 1987 hit “Never Gonna Give You Up.”
Rickrolling used to be good, harmless fun. The worst thing I can say about it is that it turned a really good song into a punchline, but I’m sure Rick Astley doesn’t care that it’s almost nothing.
Yes, it was fun, but it soon joined the Minion memes, trollfaces, and cats with a ravenous appetite for cheeseburgers. If you rickrolled someone, you were retarded (sonny). Today, it can be humorous again in an ironic way: because it’s just so NO humorous. Maybe.
A client asked us for video tutorials. Of course we have Lindy who does that, and I was thrilled to see that she sent a video. But then I remembered that we don’t have a video tutorial and realized that Lindy literally fucks our clients rickrolling. pic.twitter.com/zsvGp4NsGzAugust 19, 2024
But does the AI know this? Is Lindy being ironic here? I don’t think so. Unconsciously absurd, for sure, but not ironic. That requires real self-awareness, and I think the AI a priori the lack of self-awareness is what makes this Rickroll give me the creeps. The human Rickrolling me actually laughs at it, but what does the AI get out of it?
Although this can also be an straightforward way to gain exposure for your chatbots from online meme hunters and news writers by forcing this interaction on social media. But it’s not as fun.
Heebies, jeebies, and fakery aside, I prefer Rickrolling to the Big Red Button and ensuing mushroom cloud that some AI pessimists predict. Plus, there’s something cute about an AI chatbot resurrecting a nearly 20-year-old internet joke, right? Oh my god, I just called AI cute, didn’t I? Nobody says that to posthumanists.
