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#TrevorNoah trends worldwide

Lauren Kate Rawlins
By Lauren Kate Rawlins, ITWeb digital and innovation contributor.
Johannesburg, 31 Mar 2015
Trevor Noah's new job is all over Twitter timelines internationally.
Trevor Noah's new job is all over Twitter timelines internationally.

Yesterday, social media timelines in SA left no room for baby pictures or cat videos when they exploded with news about South African comedian, Trevor Noah, taking over from Jon Stewart as anchor of The Daily Show.

Shortly after the announcement was made, the comedian's name trended worldwide on Twitter.

After hearing the news, Noah tweeted: "No one can replace Jon Stewart. But together with the amazing team at The Daily Show, we will continue to make this the best damn news show!" This was retweeted over 14 000 times.

According to Topsy, a social analytics Web site, over the past 14 hours, ending at 8am this morning, there had been over 3 000 tweets mentioning the hashtag #TrevorNoah.

The 31-year-old comedian was congratulated by many South Africans online including radio DJ, Nicole Da Silva: "Walking around feeling proud of @trevornoah like we're related or something. Had to stop myself from asking random people if they'd heard."

Evita Bezuidenhout tweeted: "Just heard from my delighted grandchildren that @Trevornoah will host US TV's @TheDailyShow! Geluk my skat! Make it your Ark!"

Fellow comedian Deep Fried Man said: "Trevor Noah is destined to be the first South African to get onto the cover of @Forbes without the help of Photoshop."

Early jokes dug up

Controversy sparked this morning when people started going through Noah's Twitter timeline to dig up older tweets. Some found them more offensive than funny.

One user tweeted: "He has A LOT of explaining to do!!", while another said: "The Internet is turning on Trevor Noah before he's even started; I won't be watching." Another tweeted: "I was happy to hear about Trevor Noah getting The Daily Show spot, then I found out he's anti-Semitic, misogynistic, and makes fat jokes."

In reply, a Twitter user sarcastically replied: "Oh no, Trevor Noah tweeted some mildly offensive things five years ago." Another tweeted: "Media scouring old Trevor Noah tweets shows me that 1) whoever read that far back is very sad; 2) Noah has gotten better at comedy."

Noah has yet to respond to these tweets.

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