There were enough failures with Apple (constant string of failures in fact) until late 1990s. Also, if we take Yahoo!, a successful business by any measure, it is hard to assign any two years where they didn't fail at something. Mind you, Yahoo! is a prefect example of marketing-driven company, much more so than Apple (who actually prides itself more at solid design and technology).
I would honestly have a lot of difficulty naming a Yahoo! product that launched in the last 10 years, period.
I understand that Apple had more than enough failures in the 80s and 90s, but honestly they are basically a different company since 1998 when Steve Jobs came back and completely changed the trajectory of the company.
They have managed to have basically no significant failed products at all in the entire term that Google has existed at all as a company. Google and Microsoft have had several extremely high profile failures, and dozens of failures as minor as the most significant failed product that Apple had.
The stock price of the company went from 3.5 in 1997 to 350 in 2011. I just don't think that the Newton is at all relevant when talking about how careful the respective major companies are to avoid large public failures.
