TOO 2 : Z HARRIS

China has overtaken the United States as the world’s largest energy consumer, the International Energy Agency said Tuesday. China immediately questioned the report, claiming its calculations were “unreliable.”

The Paris-based agency said China’s 2009 consumption of energy sources ranging from oil and coal to wind and solar power was equal to 2.265 billion tons of oil, compared to 2.169 billion tons used that year by the United States.

The shift is historic, coming years ahead of forecasts. In climate change talks, China has long pointed fingers at the energy consumption patterns of developed nations and is sure to feel uncomfortable with the mantle of consuming more energy than any other nation.

China is also sensitive to complaints about its status as the world’s biggest polluter and suggestions that its demand is pushing up energy prices on global markets.

According to the IEA statistics, China’s energy consumption has more than doubled in less than a decade, from 1.107 billion tons in 2000 — driven by its burgeoning population and economic growth that hit 11.9 percent in the first quarter of this year.

Per capita, the United States still consumes five times more energy than China, IEA chief economist Fatih Birol told The Associated Press in an interview.

What I’d prefer, since Jobs is asking, is a company that doesn’t pee on my leg and tell me it’s the “most revolutionary rain storm ever!” A free case is all well and good. Just lose the attitude, Steve. You screwed up. We know it. You know it. Just admit it.

But back to the critics again: to those who don’t think the electronic Mail is a follower of the true faith. Which is where we reach a fork in the road.

There is no rule that says online papers must play print’s little brother. On the contrary, the most successful ones are more like inspired riffs on a print theme. Nor is there a rule that says big print sellers carry the same clout when they transfer to screen. The print Sun far outsells everything day by day but, with 20 million or so unique browsers, was trounced and trounced again by the Telegraph, Guardian and Mail before Mr Murdoch announced yet another paywall.

Why assume that the Telegraph – with 1.7 million print readers a day – must go head to head with the Mail and its 4.8 million? Why assume that the two online versions are really in such close competition either? The online market, like the print market, is beginning to set different rules for itself, to insist that quality and redtop and celeb can define different pitches (and appeals to advertisers) just as they do in the land of dead forests.

In short, it doesn’t necessarily matter that the Mail is different. Perhaps its success merely prompts other news sites to be different as well. Not one site covering all, but many sites offering alternative things. Not one site ruling the world, but many sites carving up the globe.

And once we’re dealing in niches and targeting – for readers, for ads – then paywalls become merely part of the debate: not Rupert’s (or David’s) last weapon of every resort.

I hate AT&T’s quality, but I don’t hate it enough to leave. I didn’t really understand that, but then I started keeping track of how often I use voice. On my phone I only use voice about 5% of the time I use my iPhone. Almost all the rest of the time I’m using it for Twitter, to read news, to interact with apps, to play games, to Facetime with my sons/wife, etc. In non-voice parts of using the iPhone AT&T’s lack of quality of service doesn’t matter at all. Most of the time I’m doing those kinds of things I’m on wifi anyway. To gain better voice quality, which I only use about 5% of the time, I’d have to give up a better experience on the web and in apps, which just isn’t acceptable to me.

A network will see a prolonged track of flat or, more likely, continually-declining ratings; they’ll often arrange focus groups or other additional, more detailed research to determine whether there’s any way to turn the downward trend around in the months or even year ahead. If it’s a broadcast network with affiliates, they’ll be getting that feedback as well.

In most cases, the doors are opened with the agent, or the talent himself, to gauge interest in winding down. Those conversations require the diplomacy of Hillary Clinton or Madeleine Albright. I recently had to dilute a situation when a well-known elderly on-air talent with a dwindling following not only refused to consider retirement but threatened a very public age discrimination suit. (The company got cold feet and offered a new deal.)

But once that door is even slightly cracked open, some level of negotiation begins. It can be weeks but more often months, and in some cases years, before there’s an agreement. And that involves working out terms.

I’ll wager that the time-consuming specifics on the King deal, including how many specials will be aired and who’s paying for staffing and production costs, were fully negotiated to the dollar and put into a new contract before Tuesday’s announcement.

Terms can also be as seemingly minor as managing the timing as well as having the right to view and approve what Corporate says in a statemen t… which can obviously include the right to veto who’s mentioned, such as a replacement, in the announcement.

Which is why what went down Tuesday seems so unnecessarily awkward.