• Starbucks (SBUX) presents itself as more than a coffeehouse - it’s yuppie hallowed ground, a haven where the self-important can peck at their laptops (while regularly looking up to see if you’re noticing how important they are). It's a frou-frou, faux-intellectual mountaintop with art picked from a catalog that would gag a horse.
  
  Sure, sure, Starbucks is a top-notch company. But who didn’t smirk when the company announced that it would close 600 stores? You don’t have to be a shrink to know why cutbacks at Dunkin’ Donuts wouldn’t have elicited the same response. As they say in salons of depravity on the wrong side of the tracks everywhere: Die, yuppie scum!
  
  
• If you’re an investor, Mattel’s (MAT) Barbie is still a stunner after all these years. But feminists, among others, object to the 1959-vintage babe’s pneumatic bust line and fret that her clothes teach the wrong lesson to little girls, who should aspire to be captains of industry (rather than close personal friends of Eliot Spitzer). However, Mattel did sue a company that used the doll’s name on a pornographic Web site - and MGA Entertainment may be on the hook for millions in damages after it lost yet another lawsuit filed by Mattel over rightful ownership of MGA's Bratz dolls.  
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  Naturally, the great unwashed cheered when Mattel recalled millions of toys decorated with lead-based paint. That’s a definite “Yuk!” - strong language for Barbie. 
  
  
• In its current incarnation, Apple (AAPL) can do no wrong and the iPhone should be in the Smithsonian, right up there next to the Spirit of St. Louis. That’s because the cash register-like Apple III is long gone and forgotten. In 1977, Apple had just about cornered what was then called the “microcomputer” market. With the exception of Tandy and Commodore, no other company then mass produced computers in anything other than kit form. IBM (IBM) planned to introduce a personal computer, and the pioneering folks in Cupertino feared Big Blue’s marketing muscle.
  
  So, naturally, the Apple III was a complete flop. This was a shockeroo because the Apple II, designed by Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, had been a huge hit. The Apple III was underpowered, even by the pathetic standards of the day, and a tad expensive at $3,495 to $4,995 plus monitor, hard drive and printer. The sticking point: the machine was intended to be a stopgap until the Macintosh rollout. Who would have imagined that the Apple had fallen so far from the tree or that Dell (DELL) -- a bunch of Texans, no less -- would later dominate the PC market Apple had helped create? Apple’s share of the market would continue to shrink and Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) would take a bite out of Dell.
  
  Now hear this: Jobs isn’t infallible, despite his reported propensity to toss royal hissy fits at underlings during staff meetings. Yes, Steve, we know that you didn’t single-handedly mastermind the Apple III, but that won’t stop us from blaming you retroactively and enjoying a good yuk at your expense, even if Pixar was a good move.
  

As for the masters of Schadenfreude, well, can you imagine making love in German?