Fortnite Rickrolled millions of fans to introduce its newest emote

Cal Jeffrey

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In context: We probably do not need to explain what Rickrolling is, but we will for those who have been living under a the proverbial rock. A Rickroll is an internet meme and prank where you trick someone into watching the beginning of Rick Astley's 1987 song Never Gonna Give You Up, usually by linking to a video with a misleading thumbnail and title.

Fortnite developers pulled the classic Rickroll on its nearly 10 million Twitter followers by tweeting what was supposedly a cute polar bear video. However, the link led to a clip the team had cobbled together of a couple of avatars dancing to the song.

The tweet was not just a prank, however. It was an announcement for a new emote called "Never Gonna." It resembles the way Rick Astley dances in his official video (read: poorly) and will be available to players for 500 V-bucks (about $5) in the Fortnite shop. Someone has already used the emote to remake Astley's original 1987 video in-game (below) — backdrops, camera cuts, and pans included.

Fortnite has fielded several lawsuits over allegedly ripping off dance moves and using them for emotes. Everyone from the Orange Shirt Kid to Alfonso Ribeiro has filed legal complaints against Epic Games for stealing their "signature" jigs. However, under copyright law, individual movements or dances like the Hustle or Waltz cannot be copyrighted. So currently, all the lawsuits are in limbo in the courts.

It is not likely that Epic will have to worry about Astley filing a lawsuit, though, as his music accompanies the emote in-game. Using someone else's music, commercially or otherwise, is not a legal gray area. Record labels and other companies regularly issue DMCA notices to YouTube users who upload videos containing songs they own, even if it's just playing quietly in the background. So we can safely assume Epic has licensed Astley's work, which is a first for Fortnite dance emotes.

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Star Trek Online has emote dances as well. They are small snippets of famous dance moves as seen in videos (or on TV).

• Michael Jackson's Thriller
• Michael Jackson's Smooth Operator
• Rick Astley's Never Gonna Give You Up
• "The Carlton Dance"
 
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