That's the question raised by BusinessWeek writer Peter Burrows after Apple exonerated Steve Jobs of wrongdoing in the backdating scandal.

Certainly, I made the point in this blog entry earlier this week that Apple's 10K report to the Securities and Exchange Commission raises more questions than answers.

Apple is in a uniquely precarious position because its value to investors hangs off one person, a very important one who has been the driving force behind the company's recovery and stream of innovative products. As Burrows points out, Apple's stock price has risen more than 1000 per cent since 2001, just before the iPod revolutionised the music market and entertainment, and it would fall at least 20 per cent, and keep heading south, with Jobs being sacrificed in the name of good governance. Besides that, Jobs never directly cashed in on the options and the cost to shareholders, some $84 in noncash expenses, is just lunch money for a company Apple's size.

"Is the world ready to see one of its greatest innovators sacrificed at the altar of the good-governance gods?'' asks Burrows.

Expect to see this question come up again and again over the next few months.

The company has been hit with a shareholder lawsuit accusing it of granting options worth millions of dollars to three executives the day before Jobs announced a partnership with Microsoft that sent the stock price soaring and critics say the Apple board is letting Jobs off too easily.

Reading through all the reports, the problem does not look that difficult to resolve. All the company has to do is be smarter in the way it manages the problem. A bigger mea culpa and reimbursing shareholders for any losses would be a start.