Did anyone really expect the Apple CEO was all sweetness and light?

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Sometimes, when things go wrong, some people can say things they might regret.

On the other hand, some people can say precisely what they think, in language that's unmistakably descriptive.

In the latest issue of Fortune magazine--yes, it's gettable for your iPad--there are several nuggets of joy about Apple and the way Steve Jobs ministers to his flock. Perhaps the most telling--and surely the most unsurprising--involves the somewhat punchless launch of MobileMe in 2008. The servers tended to crash and the loading times were somewhat pedestrian. So, Fortune relates, the Apple CEO called the MobileMe team into his office and reportedly got a little cross.

"Can anyone tell me what MobileMe is supposed to do?" he reportedly offered. Someone in the room ventured a response, reportedly one that made an awful lot of sense.

"So why the f*** doesn't it do that?" retorted Jobs.

Oh, and apparently that wasn't all.

"You've tarnished Apple's reputation," Jobs apparently declared. "You should hate each other for having let each other down."

That would have made for an awful lot of hating. And it would have meant a lot of hating to handle for the new executive Jobs apparently named to run the MobileMe team during the very same discussion. This "Inside Apple" article then offers other radiant details, bound to make for fascinated minds.

It reports how meeting rooms are checked for bugs before presentations; how Apple holds "Top 100" meetings, attendance at which is coveted by many; and how Jobs had a hand in designing the shuttle buses that take employees from San Francisco to Cupertino. It's fun to hear of these little amusements. But, really, should anyone be surprised? Is any company as closely identified with its leader quite as much as Apple is? So, how can anyone not imagine that, along the way, he'll get mad, he'll micromanage, and he'll have his idiosyncratic versions of inspiration?

Some of it must work, right?

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