On September 28th, South African comedian Trevor Noah took over Jon Stewart’s post as host of The Daily Show. A few days later, he received some much-needed exposure thanks to a handful of hidden videos. Uproxx discovered several unlisted YouTube videos featuring Noah that can only be found by typing specific search strings into Google.
The videos were uploaded to the Comedy Central YouTube channel, but you won’t find them there. Instead, you need to go to Google and search for “Trevor Noah gay,” “Trevor Noah race,” or a number of other specific strings. The first result for each of these searches will lead to a YouTube video in which Noah discusses the topic you searched for. If you use an ad blocker, you’ll need to disable it to find the proper Google results.
We don’t know exactly how many of these videos have been made, though Slate has documented at least 15 that have been found by curious journalists. There is even a bit of interplay between the videos; in “Trevor Noah wiki,” Noah makes reference to “Trevor Noah Crocs,” a search string that turns up a video of its own.
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Noah’s short monologues in the videos are funny, but the most clever part of the campaign is the way it riffs on Google’s auto-complete feature, which has inspired an Internet sub-genre of its own. Several of the videos refer to common (if unusual) searches from curious Google users, such as “Trevor Noah Illuminati” and “Trevor Noah shirtless.” “There’s an old saying back home in South Africa,” quips Noah in one of the videos, “you’re nobody until someone Googles you to see if you’re gay.”
When Noah first took over as Jon Stewart’s successor, we noted how important digital media would be in shaping a unique voice for him. This clever little campaign might have been hard to find, but it’s a sign that Noah and his team are off to a great start. Feel free to spend the next few minutes tying in a bunch of Google searches to see if you can add any new finds to Slate’s list.
