The Internet has a new meme: It's Alex from Target and no one knows why

The Internet loves memes. There’s Grumpy Cat, Doge, that little baby with the fist pump and now there’s a new figure in this galaxy of Internet stars: Alex from Target. So who is Alex from Target and what is his claim to fame? Well according to this BuzzFeed post, it all appears to have started with one tweet from a user called @auscalem who posted a photo of a guy named Alex working at the US store Target. She then clarified that it wasn’t her photo and told people to calm down. (Her tweets are protected, so not everyone can view them). [caption id=“attachment_1787417” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Alex from Target is a new celebrity on Twitter.[/caption] Now while the truth about the photo remains a mystery, according to BuzzFeed, by Sunday evening Alex, the good-looking blonde boy from Target, had become a real trend on the social media website, and with American teens posting under #AlexFromTarget and making memes. Check out some of the mayhem:

#AlexFromTarget

Interviewer: "So tell us about your rise to fame"

Alex: "Ya know I was just doing me, bagging some groceries one day and"

— Nash Grier (@Nashgrier) November 3, 2014

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Even Ellen DeGeneres tweeted out to Alex from Target,

Hey, #AlexFromTarget, it's #EllenFromEllen

— The Ellen Show (@TheEllenShow) November 3, 2014

And Target also decided to cash in on the trend and tweeted this out:

We heart Alex, too! #alexfromtarget pic.twitter.com/LvA7qc5RfS

— Target (@Target) November 3, 2014

We’re hoping that the guy will get a raise and not just ‘hearts’ on Twitter. As far as Alex was concerned, he’s already managed to make an appearance on CNN thanks to his new-found Twitter fame. He also tweeted about how the trend had managed to get him so many new followers. Currently the boy has close to 501k followers on Twitter. He tweeted,

Ok so i literally just realized i'm basically famous and people are impersonating me.... wowowo hahah

— DGM_Alex (@DMG_Alex163) November 3, 2014

Alex has also warned users that there are other accounts that are claiming to be Alex from Target which are fake and that people shouldn’t believe all those fake accounts. Meanwhile according to data from Topsy, the trend has seen over 1 million tweets since it began on 1 November. Check out the chart below: [caption id=“attachment_1787427” align=“alignnone” width=“620”] Trends from Topsy.[/caption] However not everything has been positive about this Twitter love for Alex. As this Gawker piece points out, Alex’s girlfriend Lindsey, who is also on Twitter has been getting threatening tweets from some users and was forced to tweet out,

So clearly while Alex has got the love, Lindsey is the target of Twitter hatred, which is not entirely surprising given that Twitter users often have a hard time at understanding where to drawn the line. For Twitter, though it’s a great story since it confirms that teens (at least US teens) are in fact it’s biggest and heaviest users and overall it should be seen as a positive trend for the site’s future.