... which is completely ridiculous, for two reasons. One, Wikipedia is based in America, and so naturally its English should be consistently American. Two, modern English as spoken and written in England has grammar problems -- e.g., the insistence on using plurals for singular objects, such as corporations ("Shell Oil have announced ..."). Therefore, American English is obviously preferable.
The thing that really kills me about your comment is that you seem to think that your off-the-top-of-your-head points are somehow novel, as if no Wikipedian has ever mentioned them before.
And that's exactly the mistake Sullivan makes, too. You're both wrong, of course: discussions on these topics go back years, with hundreds or thousands of smart participants.
But at least you haven't done like Sullivan and a million others by following up your naiveté with outrage that you aren't being respected for your genius, insight, and expertise.
The English uses plural for corporations because they are referring to the mass of entities that make up the corporation (including people, brands, products). I don't think this is a grammatical problem, but a societal/philosophical viewpoint on what a corporation is. If you are American, of course it seems weird, but within the context of English society, it is internally self consistent with English grammar.
