Avoiding a Rickroll
Know what to look for. If a video/site is a little too good/interesting to be true, then it's most likely going to be a rick roll or some other Internet prank. (Video ex: How to get a nuke with one kill on mw2 or Jurassic Park 4 Official Trailer.)
Take a good look at the URL. If, say you wanted to go to the Amazon website, make sure the URL says "www.amazon.com". If it says something slightly different, like "www.amaz0n.com", then it's probably a fake website. Even if it's not a rickroll, it can be something worse, like a scam website. If the URL ends in ".edu", you're in the clear-- this ending means that it's an academic website. Similarly, websites ending in ".gov" are from the government. These sites are highly unlikely to have rickrolls on them, but it is still possible.
Stop it and read the comments if it's a video. Sometimes the creator has multiple accounts and they will say it's not a rick roll. In that case, check the date that these accounts were created. A large number of dislikes can point out the rickroll too. Comments and dislikes disabled altogether are also an obvious sign of the rickroll. If the dislikes aren't disabled, but the comments are, take a closer look. If you see a button marked "Try YouTube Kids", then you're probably safe-- this means that the video's comments are disabled because the video is for kids (or was wrongly marked as for kids by the AI). If the video is about something controversial like politics, that could also justify the comments being disabled. If neither of these apply, though... Screenshot 2022 04 27 YTKids.png
Look under the like/dislike bar. Often YouTube will insert an advertisement to buy the song, so you can pause the video before it starts the song.
Try using search engines that suggest the sites to avoid sites where you get rick rolled. These will send you to the right sites (Ex: Bing.com.)
Remember rickrolls usually happen on interesting subjects. If you are very interested in a video/site it may be a rick roll. Sometimes people like to pretend a rickroll is a website you visit daily, like a school website or a news website. People may try to get you to click on a popular website and disguise it as a rick roll. This is uncommon.
Download an automatic pause plugin. When you open a YouTube video, it automatically starts playing. There are plugins for all browsers that automatically pause the video when you open the page. That way you can check the comments before to make sure it's not a rick roll.
If You Get Rickrolled
Don't get too frustrated. If you get rickrolled, never let yourself get too mad, as this will only make it worse. Of course, we can't really control how we feel, but we can choose not to dwell on things that we dislike. For instance, if what you thought was an informative video turns out to be a rick roll, you might think, "Well, that's annoying-- I guess I'll have to search on Wikipedia instead of YouTube", rather than leaving an angry comment.
Learn to like the song. If you're going to get rickrolled, you might as well enjoy it. If, however, you can never like the song no matter how hard you try to teach yourself to, don't sweat it. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, even if it's a negative opinion. Also, if you hate being rickrolled despite liking the song, that's OK too. After all, nobody wants to be promised something and then get something different.
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