I have always seen Apple's design promise as being 'we create beautiful products that people want' more than 'we create functional products that people want'.<p>If I understand Donald Norman's design philosophy correctly, he says 'create something beautiful and people will think it performs better than it actually does'.<p>Therefore, Apple hasn't failed on their design promise. They promise to make beautiful products and market them in such a way that people can't stop drooling and talking about them.<p>If the question is does Apple make high quality products that work, we can't blame all the flaws on AT&T, Apple released a phone that drops the signal if you hold it in your right hand, and this is a 'feature' that Jobs promoted as exceptional design!
It may be exceptional because it is beautiful and allowed them to make the phone thinner. It isn't exceptional because it works.