Apple has hidden a Rickroll in plain sight in its latest Apple Watch help page, with a FAQ on how to add friends on your Apple Watch spelling out a very familiar reference.
Sure, it’s all a bit 2008 by now, but there’s still something hilarious about Apple spelling out “NE VE RG ON NA GI VE YU UP” as the initials of your apparent Apple Watch friends.
Well played, Apple. Well played!
Photo: Apple
This isn’t the first time Apple has referenced Rick Astley’s 1987 song, “Never Gonna Give You Up.” During this year’s WWDC, Craig Federighi demoed Safari by opening up a website with a video concerning, “How To Wow An Audience.” He then started the video, only to get Rickrolled.
For those unfamiliar with Rickrolling, it’s a long-time Internet meme in the form of a bait and switch. As Wikipedia explains:
“[A] person provides a hyperlink which is seemingly relevant to the topic at hand, but actually leads to Astley’s video. The link can be masked or obfuscated in some manner so that the user cannot determine the true destination of the link without clicking. People led to the music video are said to have been rickrolled.”
With the likes of Siri, Apple has long included humorous Easter Eggs in its products. This one may be my all-time favorite, however.
Source: Forbes
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
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I’m waiting for the Goatse roll to make a comeback – the original mis-click.
Samsung is already making a new help page at this moment. It will include letters for their new friends application, which will be *slightly* ovalled and the initials will read LE YT SM AN GN AG.