Some of Apple’s biggest successes include such products as: * Macintosh: Released in 1984, it became the first computer to integrate two elements we are all familiar with in computers today: GUIs and mice. Drag-and-drop was introduced to the world at large on the Macintosh, as was the concept of folders, file icons, and a trash can on the computer screen. * Pixar: Steve Jobs bought Pixar in 1986 from Lucasfilm. He originally wanted to use the company to help develop graphics-rendering hardware and software, but as it evolved into an animation studio, a deal with Disney to produce fully-CG feature-length family films wound up in a series of blockbusters, awards, and mountains of cash. Today Pixar, now owned fully by Disney, is one of the biggest names in film CG animation. * iPod/iTunes: Originally released in 2001, the portable media device known as iPod didn’t seem like a likely candidate to kick off as large a change in the music industry as it did. It quickly got refined in future generations, and was the premier, even household, name in portable media players for many years. iTunes, released in 2003, similarly revolutionized the music industry with its easily-downloadable media library that was pretty much the only thing allowing non-Apple computers to sync with iPods. iTunes eventually killed big box record stores such as Tower Records and Virgin Media megastores.

Some of Apple’s biggest failures included such products as: * Apple Lisa: Released in the mid-1980s, it was one of the first PCs that used a GUI and multitasking, which at the time of its release was cutting-edge. However, at $10,000 at first release, which in today’s money would buy you a nice brand-new car, it was marked as a failure in 1986 as Apple allowed trade-ins for the Mac Plus for $1500. Having said that Lisa was a failure, though, it is important to note that its