This site has information about the protests, as well as links to other sites. The Real Cost of Gas is a good overview of why some people are pissed off at the Petroleum industry, including assessments of cost to taxpayers, and environmental and health impacts. Beyond program subsidies, governments, and thus taxpayers, subsidize a large portion of the protection services required by petroleum producers and users. Foremost among these is the cost of military protection for oil-rich regions of the world. There was an excellent commentary piece by Kevin Michael Grace on the CBC this morning that summed up quite nicely what the protests are all about, as opposed to how the media portrays them.
Grace goes on to explain very clearly who exactly is doing the protesting, and why.
It's quite well done. If you click on no other link today, check this one out. It boils down to the fact that researchers in academia have to publish in refereed journals in order to get their jobs, and keep them. It's often much harder to get electronic rights back, partly because of publisher ignorance, traditional profits from microfilm and sales to libraries, and, more often now, future plans for CD or web versions of the journal. And so on.