Someone’s Rickrolling Parking Tickets in North Carolina
Real-world trolling, executed brilliantly.
In what can only be described as an epic act of IRL trolling, an unknown individual has been wandering the streets of Asheville, North Carolina, issuing parking tickets. Except they're fake. Oh, and the QR code on the citations that redirects to the music video for "Never Gonna Give You Up." That's right, folks: Somebody is Rickrolling people via parking tickets.
The fake tickets are so convincing, at least one person has brought one to Asheville City Hall trying to pay the fine, according to WLOS News. A male meter maid (meter butler?) later found a second ticket.
While the fake ticket looks convincing, the differences are obvious when it's laid beside a real City of Asheville parking citation. The false tickets set the fine at $100, but real Asheville parking citations are for only $10. The date was off, too—the tickets were found on March 4, but were dated March 5. The name of the issuing officer, "A. Roach," doesn't match any real Asheville parking official. (It does, however, offer a pretty good hint about what the ticket-maker was doing when s/he came up with the idea.)
The pièce de résistance, though, is the QR code printed at the bottom of the ticket: Instead of offering a way to pay or appeal, it pushes smartphones to that infamous Rick Astley video that's delighted and aggravated Internet users in equal measure since 2007.
Asheville officials, unsurprisingly, are not amused.
"It causes us extra work, causes aggravation for our citizens, and I really think somebody's doing it for a prank," parking services manager Harry Brown told WLOS. "I think it's just an aggravation, and somebody you know, wanting to get a little publicity, or say ha ha."
Residents who come across the fake tickets are encouraged to report the date, time and location they found it using this form on the City of Asheville's Parking Services website.
