The Guardian: 92-year-old’s website leaves oil giant Shell-shocked: Monday 26 October 2009
How online protesters are using ‘gripe site’ as the focus for their complaints about big business
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Russell Hotten
The Guardian, Monday 26 October 2009
At 92 years old, Alfred Donovan is an unlikely online campaigner. But he and his son John, 62, have been a painful thorn in the side of Royal Dutch Shell for more than a decade. The pair run one of the oldest and most effective “gripe sites”, and the oil giant’s army of well-paid lawyers do not know how to neutralise them.
The number of so-called “gripe sites”, which exist to criticise, mock, and generally annoy companies, people, and institutions, has exploded in recent years, and the trend is set to continue.