Rickrolling wasn’t ‘ha ha you listened to an overplayed song.’ It was the punchline to successful trolling. You’d wind people up with a story and provide alleged video evidence. Suddenly they’d know they were duped. The tension, the emotional investment, was yanked out from under them. It’s the comedy version of a jump scare.
Basically, do you know who Shittymorph is?
But this being the internet, a lot of people Did Not Get It, and thought the entire gag was the mild annoyance of unexpected exposure to some above-average pop hit. The meme died because of their clueless misuse and overuse.