I still can’t believe that no one pulled the R & D folks at Apple aside and suggested a different name for the latest in the “i” family – iPad.
I’ve seen several threads on friends’ FB pages and the Mad TV clip that predates the real iPad. One comment read “my mind didn’t even go in that direction”. I’m not sure what direction that would be, but my mind goes that direction every month. It’s called menstruation. Yes, every month until the good Lord and my hormones say enough is enough. Really? No one in the know at Apple played word association and made the connection? Does this point to the absence or type of influence women have over there in Apple land? What say you?
On the other hand, is it that big of a deal? So what if the ultra-thin iPad makes me and many other men and women think of a maxi pad. Surely they could have come up with a better, cooler name, but perhaps all of the nervous laughter and joking has less to do with associating a cool, sleek, over-priced techno toy with a feminine hygiene product than our culture’s inability to reconcile it’s obsession with sexuality and appropriate comfort with all things sexual, including menstruation and pads of all kinds.
It’s no big deal to me. And, no, I didn’t make the connection until I heard people making a fuss about it.
I hadn’t made the association until I heard others talking about it…but perhaps it was a conscious choice by their marketing people…Think of the free press…It got you (and how many more people?!) to blog about!
uh, it’s the first thing i thought of but i’m the kind of person who makes all kinds of word associations every millisecond…
i’m like, i(have a)Pad? uh, are you kidding me?
perhaps the guys at apple, regardless of how cool they THINK they are, are just a bunch of engineering gear heads after all. 😉
I think if the iPad goes the way of the iPod and iPhone, it will be so ubiquitous and so well-branded the double meaning will be passe. And if it fails, it will be a hilarious jeopardy question in 10 years.
I can personally think of lots of everyday products that have salacious double meanings, but go otherwise unnoticed. However, I will from mentioning them publicly (but I am giggling in my mind).