Released earlier today, Reddit’s 2020 Year in Review announced the site’s most upvoted posts of the last 12 months. The winner: Rick Astley getting Rickrolled.
Way back in June, Astley posted a backstage picture of himself from his first tour in 1989. But it wasn’t just Astley’s picture that made the post memorable, it was a comment. Redditor theMalleableDuck responded, “I think I might cry!!! It’s actually you. I met you at a backstage event when I was 12. Seriously a big fan. I’ve seen you in concert five times.” Rick should’ve seen this coming. The backstage event wasn’t a backstage event at all. It was a Rickroll.
I’ve found a few funny memories during lockdown. This is from my 1st tour in 89, backstage in Vegas. from r/pics
Astley’s original post received more than 418,000 points (98% upvoted), while theMallaeableDuck received more than 133,000 points for the alley-oop.
The Rickroll wasn’t the only meme on the list. Redditor rextraneous’ reversal of the “Putting on Clown Makeup” meme to represent the deradicalization of a flat-earther won more than 303,000 points (99% upvoted).
The top five also includes two entries from /r/PublicFreakout: a video of “police and National Guard patrolling neighborhood and shooting civilians,” (272,000 upvotes) and an edit of the infamous “Everybody’s Trying to Shame Us” video (258,000 upvotes). Of course, what would a year-end review be without a photo of shopping carts filled with toilet paper, which received more than 271,000 upvotes.
Reddit published a wealth of stats, including the upvoted AMAs of 2020 (Borat), the most mentioned subject (coronavirus) and the daily active user numbers (52 million).
You check out the full list over on Reddit’s blog and reflect on the year online.
Source: https://news.knowyourmeme.com/news/rick-astley-rickrolled-in-reddits-top-post-of-the-year