About

Rick Rubin Wearing Headphones is a reaction image of record producer Rick Rubin, a man with a big white beard, wearing Audeze headphones with his eyes closed and his hand on a computer mouse, as if listening to music intently while producing. The image was popularized as an image macro format in January 2025, in which it is used alongside captions, both ironic and genuine, that paint Rubin as a master in the field of programming, producing, engineering or another similar profession.

Origin

On January 6th, 2016, the Chord Electronics Facebook^[1] page posted an advertisement that shows record producer and Def Jame Recordings co-founder Rick Rubin using Audeze headphones with his eyes closed while seemingly producing music on a Mac, writing, "It was great to see Rick Rubin again in our suite at CES. Always a gentleman…," garnering around 53 likes in nine months. On September 9th, 2021, the Audeze Instagram^[2] page reposted a crop of the image.

On January 10th, 2025, X^[3] user @0xgaut posted the cropped version of the image under the caption, "'Do you use a/b tests?' 'No,'" garnering over 2,200 likes in three days. This is the earliest known example of the meme.

Spread

The meme became increasingly popular over the following days. On January 10th, 2025, X^[4] user @aleksliving posted a version of the meme captioned, "designing an entire b2b saas without talking to a single user," garnering over 11,000 likes in three days.

On January 11th, X^[5] user @CharlesPattson posted a version of the meme captioned, "Designers after drawing a single rectangle," garnering over 2,300 likes in two days. On the same day, a recreation of the meme by @aleksliving was posted to /r/ProgrammerHumor,^[6] garnering over 2,700 upvotes in two days.

Later that day, X^[7] user @leeerob posted a version of the meme that garnered over 8,100 likes in two days. The meme was reposted to /r/ProgrammerHumor^[8] on January 12th, garnering over 150 upvotes in a day. On January 12th, u/dranzerfu made a post to /r/OutOfTheLoop^[9] asking about the meme, garnering over 50 upvotes in a day.

Various Examples

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Search Interest

External References