The example states the following:
<?php
// list() doesn't work with strings
list($bar) = "abcde";
var_dump($bar);
// output: NULL
?>
If the string is in a variable however, it seems using list() will treat the string as an array:
<?php
$string = "abcde";
list($foo) = $string;
var_dump($foo);
// output: string(1) "a"
?>