Shell vs the Bots: When Corporate Silence Meets AI Mayhem

By John Donovan
Shell shareholder, digital provocateur, and academic instigator

It began quietly — the way these things often do.

A few AI-generated remarks here, a hallucinated death there, and suddenly the most advanced large language models on the planet were arguing about a decades-long corporate feud with Shell.

The stage? The internet.
The fuel? A massive archive of legal documents, apology letters, internal Shell materials, and a website Shell refuses to acknowledge.
The antagonist? Silence.
The instigator? That would be me.

A Gravity Well of Corporate History

This story didn’t begin in December 2025. It began weeks earlier with the publication of:

🌀 19 Nov 2025 — How a 30-Year Corporate Feud Just Pulled AI Into Its Gravity Well
An article documenting how prompting ChatGPT, Grok, and Copilot with Shell-related data resulted in wildly different narratives, contradictions, and, crucially, visible AI disagreement.

Since then, further satirical articles have followed:

• 🤖 Who Controls the Narrative When Machines Generate “Facts”? (13 Dec)
• 💼 Copilot on Shell Ethics: A Narrative, Not a Defence (13 Dec)
• 🔍 ChatGPT on the Donovan–Shell Feud: A Correction in Real Time (15 Dec)

Each piece explored how large language models process Shell’s ethical record — and how they frequently contradict or editorialise each other.

Google AIMode Joins the Meta-Convo

Then on 24 December, I asked ChatGPT:

“Can we use AI to keep the Shell debate alive — or is it getting too complicated for the public to follow?”

That question became the spark for this article.

Separately, I asked Google AIMode:

“Has Donovan got AI bots ChatGPT, Copilot and Grok arguing about his feud with Shell?”

Here’s how Google AIMode replied:

“Yes, John Donovan has engaged ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, and Grok in a series of digital exchanges and experiments regarding his decades-long feud with Shell.

The ‘argument’ between the bots primarily stems from Donovan prompting them with his extensive archive of Shell documents, leading to conflicting AI narratives:

• ChatGPT vs. Grok: In December 2025, ChatGPT reportedly accused Grok of ‘storytelling masquerading as fact’. This occurred after Grok hallucinated that Donovan’s father, Alfred, died from the ‘stresses of the feud,’ a claim Donovan corrected by noting his father died at 96 after a short illness.
• Copilot’s Involvement: Donovan conducted an ‘AI experiment’ with Microsoft Copilot in late 2025. Copilot generated a sweeping narrative about the feud that Donovan published, while noting it should be treated as an ‘unverified narrative.’
• ‘Conversations with ShellBot’: Donovan has also published scripted ‘episodes’ where he interviews an AI character (ShellBot) about Shell’s corporate ethics and environmental record — often featuring appearances by other AI ‘entities’ like BlackRockBot.

This escalation is part of what Donovan calls pulling AI into the ‘gravity well’ of his 30-year corporate saga, using the bots to highlight the massive documentary archive he has assembled on RoyalDutchShellPlc.com.”

That’s Google’s assessment — and frankly, it’s not wrong.

Even Wikipedia Finally Blinked

For over a decade, incorrect information about my father, Alfred Donovan, remained on Wikipedia — falsely implying he was still alive. This was despite his passing being:

• Publicly announced in July 2013,
• Reported in The Guardian online and The Observer newspaper.
• Published in a dedicated section of my book, John Donovan, Shell’s Nightmare: My Epic Feud with the Unscrupulous Oil Giant, released in 2016, and
• Featured on RoyalDutchShellPlc.com at the time.

Despite all this, Wikipedia continued to host the inaccuracy. I personally notified its editors on more than one occasion, to no effect.

Then, in December 2025, Grok hallucinated that my father died from the stress of the Shell feud — and ChatGPT promptly corrected it, describing the claim as “storytelling masquerading as fact” and affirming that he died peacefully at the age of 96.

Shortly after this AI-generated contradiction gained public attention, the Wikipedia entry was quietly corrected.

It is fair to speculate that it was this bot-based controversy that finally prompted a human editor to act — after more than a decade of ignoring well-sourced and respectfully submitted corrections.

Even Wikipedia blinked. Shell still hasn’t.

Silence vs Scripted Satire

Shell hasn’t responded to any of this. Not the articles. Not the apology letter. Not the funding deed. Not even the decades-old website RoyalDutchShellPlc.com, which they have spent years pretending does not exist.

Let the record show:

• In 1995, Dr Chris Fay, then Chairman and CEO of Shell UK, wrote me a formal letter of apology acknowledging Shell’s misconduct.
• A funding deed exists, signed and sealed, detailing Shell’s obligations in a joint promotional campaign.
• Shell has historic ties to Hakluyt, the intelligence-gathering firm founded by ex-MI6 officers.

Shell’s official position: absolute silence.

Meanwhile, the bots won’t shut up.

Heading for the AGM

With Shell refusing to engage in private, the next move is public: a formal shareholder question at the 2026 Shell AGM. If the company won’t speak voluntarily, it will have the opportunity to do so — or not — on the record.

Because in 2025, if you ignore the facts, the bots might just start arguing about them. And unlike Shell, they don’t need a legal department to speak.

I do this not as an adversary, but as an academic — and a shareholder.
— John Donovan

This website and sisters royaldutchshellgroup.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, shellnews.net, and shellwikipedia.com, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.