iPad Announcement: Period Jokes, Unanswered Questions

By Sherrie Gulmahamad on January 27th, 2010

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Today’s iPad announcement and demo revealed a startling lack of maturity across Facebook, the Twitter Universe, and the general blogosphere as the iPad’s ill-chosen moniker lead to iTampon jokes and the inevitable “there’s an app for that” refrains.

But what’s behind the giggling schoolboy nature of all of this? After the tired jokes landed and we all had a 10 second giggle, another whisper emerges from the feminine world.

Did any women have any input into this name?
Are there any women at all in the power ranks of Apple Corp?
How about in the marketing department?

Will any creature with a uterus step forward to explain this clumsy naming?

This article from 2008 sheds some sad light on what’s going on, gender-wise, in America’s halls of power.

In 2007, executive search firm Spencer Stuart found that nine percent of Standard and Poor’s 500 companies–an index of 500 large firms whose stocks are actively traded–had all-male corporate boards.

This included Apple, the Cupertino, Calif., computing company, and News Corporation, the New York-based media conglomerate owned by Rupert Murdoch. Apple has since recruited Andrea Jung, the CEO of Avon Products, and News Corp. has recruited 27-year-old opera singer Natalie Bancroft.

I can’t find any specific evidence that there aren’t any bra-wearers in Apple’s marketing department, but this news alone, that no women sat on Apple’s corporate board until 2008, is pretty depressing.

So what say you, ladies?

1) I don’t care. I need the newest shiny device and hopefully the iPad will bring the publishing world back to life.
2) It still reminds me of menstruation.

And by the way, the whole period joke, is REALLY old. Old enough to be on MadTV.