For those who missed it,
this week’s “Amusing Monday” came early on Thursday, when a
fake video was posted on YouTube claiming to show a party being
held to celebrate the sendoff of oil rigs to the Alaskan
Arctic.
It seems like a funny and creative stunt, even knowing that it
had nothing to do with Shell. But I do believe that it damages the
credibility of those involved, especially those who had some
credibility to begin with.
Greenpeace bloggers played an important role in trying to
convince people that the video was real. Here’s a portion of the
post by Guy Usher:
“So I just spoke with one of our experienced oil campaigners at
Greenpeace International and did a little digging, to find out a
little more about the guests at Shell’s swanky event.
“The Chief Engineer of the Kulluk (who was the guest of honor)
worked for Mitsui. You know what else Mitsui built? The Deepwater
Horizon. And they paid a $90 million fine for the BP oil spill.
“The late husband of the woman who got sprayed in the face
worked for Sedco. That’s Sedco as in Transocean-Sedco (or, as of
2003, just Transocean)—which owned the Deepwater Horizon.”
Well, the woman who played the wet, offended woman was actually
Dorli Rainey, an 84-year-old activist who gained national attention
when she was pepper-sprayed at an Occupy Seattle rally.
The video above provides a behind-the-scenes look at what it
took to create the hoax along with a little political
commentary.
Greenpeace bloggers have now revealed a few details of the Shell
party spoof, which received a lot of attention on the Internet.
See JTurner’s blog.
I still think it’s a funny video, even knowing it is fake. But
there may some additional fallout for Greenpeace: Anyone who didn’t
question statements by Greenpeace before must now be on guard
against fraudulent claims by the environmental group, especially
when the information comes from Greenpeace bloggers.
—–
They almost got me.
Word on the street this morning was that Logan Price of Occupy
Wall Street had wrangled his way into a party last night at the
Space Needle involving people connected with Shell oil-drilling
operations. Price had a video showing people celebrating the launch
of two oil rigs about to leave Seattle for the Alaskan Arctic.
This is in connection with the
story I wrote Monday about the Greenpeace ship Esperanza.
On a serving table at the party was a model of an oil rig that
was supposed to dispense drinks. Check out the video below.
Quite a few people took the bait and quickly blogged about this
ironic video, posting comments such as this one by Tree Hugger, “If
Shell can’t even handle a three-foot replica of a rig that pumps
booze, how is the company going to fare in the Arctic deep?”
Many other bloggers climbed on board and passed on the video
with similar comments, including a blogger for the Seattle P-I.
Soon the video spiraled up in the view count.
I was about to post a blog item with my comment, “Didn’t the
Shell p.r. types think about the irony if something were to go
wrong with the little ‘drilling rig’? Well, you know, Murphy’s Law
and all that.”
But I paused to call someone at Shell for a comment and reached
company spokeswoman Kayla Macke, who sent me this comment by
email:
“Thanks for the call. Please see our response below: Recently
groups that oppose Shell’s plans in offshore Alaska have posted a
fraudulent video that appears to show Shell employees at an event
at the Seattle Space Needle. Shell did not host, nor participate in
an event at the Space Needle and the video does not involve Shell
or any of its employees. We continue to focus on a safe exploration
season in 2012.”
So was the video a hoax or was Shell just covering up an
embarrassing situation? I needed to find out, so I began making
more calls and placing more emails to get hold of anyone connected
with the Seattle “event.”
Meanwhile,
Greenpeace blogger Guy Usher reported that had he contacted
some experienced campaigners in Greenpeace International who
identified two people in the video. I’m trying to contact Usher to
see if he still believes the video is real.
Most bloggers have now reversed their initial comments and
reported their belief that the video is a hoax, especially after
seeing the evidence compiled by Adrian Chen of
Gawker.com.:
“The main proof that this is a hoax comes from the website of
Wainwright & Shore, “a
full service, integrated marketing public relations and interactive
firm” supposedly based in Houston, Texas. Wainwright & Shore boasts
“The company donates more than 300 hours of pro bono services to
non-profit clients each year.”
“But according to the whois
records, the domain was registered just last month. And the
clincher: The domain name server is Mayfirst.org, a lefty-radical
hosting company which was also used by notorious pranksters the Yes
Men to host a fake Bank of America website
back in April.”
The latest development, according to a
blog on “Ad Age,” is that someone is sending out fake press
releases saying Shell plans to sue those responsible for the
video.
While this video may be kind of fun for most of us, I guess it
could create problems for Shell.
I was planning to post this as an “Amusing Monday” next week,
but I’m not sure at the moment whether the video will remain
available if YouTube is pressured to take it down, so I decided to
post Monday’s blog entry a few days early.
