139 points

“Under the age of 30”, huh?

Alright, nerds, just so we’re clear, that was more than 15 years ago. Assuming this is current, which it probably isn’t, that “53yo” dad was in his late 30s at the time, could very much have been posting about it when it happened. Given the current average age for having kids, “bumblebeebats” was probably wearing diapers by the time the Internet got to the point of entirely abstracting it to shapes. There is a longer period of time between loss.jpg and now than between the first rickroll and loss.jpg.

If it makes you feel any better, all of this is hurting me just as bad as it’s hurting you.

permalink
report
reply
50 points

It’s wild to me that ctl+alt+del is relevant today at all. I used to read webcomics in high school all the time, CAD included. Loss was definitely eye opening, it was a real moment of “wasn’t this comic about video games?” But then it was forgotten about for so long. It’s a marvel to me that random moment in such a dated comic got meme’d on this hard.

permalink
report
parent
reply
13 points

Aren’t all (or almost all) memes famous randomly though? No one expected a sort of doofy photo of a teen to be famous for years for having bad luck, for example.

permalink
report
parent
reply
5 points

Very true! I guess I just never expected a random webcomic I stopped reading years ago to ever be relevant again haha.

permalink
report
parent
reply
18 points

It looks to be past-this-year-april-recent since the icon next to the username was a thing tumblr did for April Fools this year.

(Sorry old man)

permalink
report
parent
reply
18 points

Even better. There’s a solid chance Bumble wasn’t even born when loss.jpg happened.

What a life.

permalink
report
parent
reply
69 points

It’s a parent kind of fun to appropriate youth slang and use it wrong so that the kids find it cringy.

permalink
report
reply
4 points

This is the only reason I still teach teenagers after 17 years, and I will not expound further.

permalink
report
parent
reply
3 points

Rickroll: (v) to troll the youth using memes

Makes sense!

permalink
report
parent
reply
54 points

:.|:;

permalink
report
reply
75 points

𓀥    𓁆 𓀕

𓁆 𓀟   𓀣 𓁀

permalink
report
parent
reply
17 points

Wow, so it is indeed hieroglyph.

permalink
report
parent
reply
49 points

“Under 30”? I’m 32 and I read Ctrl Alt Del in my sophomore year of high school. I was probably on the younger end of people reading it at the time it came out.

I swear the Internet is trying to make me feel ancient 💀

permalink
report
reply
16 points

Imagine actually having seen any Ctrl Alt Del comics other than Loss, can’t be me

permalink
report
parent
reply
6 points

I read a bunch of webcomics, and I currently read a bunch of manga, mahwa, manhua, web novels, and yes, still some webcomics. I have some favorites, but some aren’t that good and are just junk food.

Ctrl Alt Del was never a favorite, nor something I’d check all the time, but every once in a while I’d click through it and read some of it. I probably read it similarly often as Penny Arcade, which didn’t really appeal duper heavily to me either.

permalink
report
parent
reply
3 points
*

Yes this is close to my route as well. 90’s and 2000’s webcomics (Penny Arcade, Megatokyo, Looking For Group, Ctrl Alt Delete) and sprite comics (Bob and George), then to Manga Scanlations, Anime fan subs then Manwha, and the occasional Manhua. Currently destroying my neurons by wading through Isekai manga and Regression Manwha power or revenge fantasy nonsense.

But thinking back, those were fun days. The fun continues of course, just have to keep panning for new gold with new authors.

permalink
report
parent
reply
2 points

I imagine they were funny like dane cook was funny.

permalink
report
parent
reply
43 points

It’s more plausible that a 53 year old knows what a Rick roll is than for his kid to not know that

permalink
report
reply