Analysts expected Apple to earn $2.45 per share. Actual profit: $3.33 per share. The stock is up $17 in after hours, hitting $260. I am in awe and agree to retract and regret an entire 2004 column that said: "These days Apple is just another Standard & Poor's 500 member trying to hit quarterly earnings targets."
After the column ran I got royally flamed online for saying Apple was no longer the company Steve Jobs had founded. The flamers who thought I was wrong were right.