Indeed, Apple's massive success story over the last 15 years probably had a lot to do with ignoring Wall Street outright. This is easier said than done, as most

Indeed, Apple's massive success story over the last 15 years probably had a lot to do with ignoring Wall Street outright. This is easier said than done, as most CEOs feel enslaved by the quarterly reporting cycle. Apple made long-term bets instead of short-term optimizations on paper. So the interesting question is: why was Apple able to do this, when other major corporations can't seem to shake their Wall Street shackles? I would guess that it had a lot to do with an early chain of big hits. The iPod, followed by the massively successful generations of subsequent iPods and iTunes, gave Jobs a large degree of immunity to criticism (and he still got quite a bit of criticism!). The iPhone had its pre-launch naysayers, in finance and in the press, but Apple's share price didn't take any real damage as a result. And so on with other product launches, up until recently. Prove the analysts hugely wrong for years on end, and eventually their critiques won't hurt you. But getting to that point in the first place is the tricky part.