This is the gentleman who wrote the artcle today for upstreamonline. I'm not familiar with him but in a review of his work, he looks to have written almost 2,000 articles over a number of years. He's written about the industry extensively and appears very plugged in to what is happening around the world.
When considering the reliability of the information, I certainly always consider the source. Perhaps someone is more familiar with him than I am but my initial impression is he is a reliable source. This isnt coming from The National or some questionable character at Seeking Alpha.
As you can see from the poll a while back, I voted for JKM as our likely partner. Shell comes as a surprise to me. I have also supported the notion of why a SM wouldnt just buy all of E/A or IOC for that matter. I look forward to an "official" announcement!