It's a heck of a lot less painful than learning from your own, now isn't it? If ever there were a teflon-coated company, it's Apple. That doesn't mean they don't make mistakes (can you say Newton?). But, here's an interesting write-up on some of Apple's more classic examples of textbook mistakes turned into triumph.

There are some common themes that runs through most of the examples:

- Apple doesn't always get the product right, but they seem to always get the customer right addressing what they really, really want.

- Want is a more powerful force than need. (Does anyone really need an iPhone? Did you see the news footage of those people camping out all week for the first ones to hit store shelves?)

- What customers usually want is something intangible like ease of use, status, simplicity, a certain lifestyle.

- Get that one big thing right and you'll be forgiven for all the little things you get wrong (just fix them promptly).

- All that being said, don't push it! Apple gets away with murder. It's Apple and it has a rabid customer base that will stump cultural anthropologists for generations to come who study them.