Here's a get-well-soon gift idea: An Apple board with a grip

There exists a man named Steve Jobs. If we were to tell his life story, it would include his parentage of diverse companies. Some grew up smart and strong (Pixar). Some struggled through brief lives but live on in memory (NeXT). And then there's Apple -- the immature brat that refuses to move out of the house and do its own damn laundry.

Seriously, Apple board members, what have you been thinking all these years, that you spend your time during Jobs' six-month medical leave whining like a two-year-old about when Daddy's coming home and acting shifty when someone rings the doorbell? How did you let yourself get into a situation where corporate-governance folks want to string you up for not giving up even more information about what should by rights be a private and peaceful time in Jobs' life?

The problem, to my way of thinking, is not that you're not giving up enough information on the health of your CEO. That's for the SEC to decide, and apparently for every nervous investor, blogger and Mac fanboy in the universe to speculate on. (Ripped from the RSS headlines this week: Steve Jobs hasn't logged in on IM for weeks! ZOMG it must be really bad!)

Personally, I don't care except in wish-him-well terms about Steve Jobs' condition or prognosis. (Though if the board is lying to investors, I hope they end up bunking with Nacchio in federal pokey. I'll bet that guy snores.) A lot of people are so emotionally invested in Apple products that they feel entitled to a personal opinion on Jobs' well-being, but frankly, those people also need to back off and get a life. That way, maybe when they're really ill someone real will care about them too. It could happen.

No, I care that the board has been so lax in managing the situation that Jobs is still "deeply involved in all strategic matters," as co-lead director Arthur Levinson put it, during his so-called leave -- pointing to an inability for a major technology and innovation company to operate without one specific guy. He shouldn't be -- for the sake of his health, sure, but really for the sake of the company's.

What on earth does Apple's board risk by displaying an ability to move on? Certainly not Jobs' leadership; he's proven that he can comfortably jump back into the saddle after an absence, if he so chooses. And, frankly, we saw after 1997 that getting away from Apple for a while was a good thing for his vision and creativity. (Daddy needed some grown-up time?)

The implication that Jobs is so integral to the company that he cannot be allowed to recuperate in peace makes a lot of us doubt that the company can survive when, sooner or later, he doesn't come back. If Apple honestly cannot function without Jobs -- if the iPod, the MacBooks Pro and Air, the iPhone, and such might as well have shipped from the man's living room -- the leadership needs to fess up quick so all those people working in Cupertino can go beg Google or Microsoft for jobs. And then they ought to apologize to all of us, because it didn't have to be like this.

If not -- if Apple truly still attracts bright young things with big talent, and if the company has the ability to recognize said intelligence and talent when it's not wearing wire-rim glasses and a black turtleneck (really, Rick Cook? you wore a black shirt and jeans to the meeting this week? now you're just making me sad) -- prove it. We all know the process that brings a hot new product takes 12-18 months, but if you're being truthful, if you really do have a succession plan in hand, you can execute on that much more quickly. Right now would be good.

If you don't do so, or do something, people are going to lack faith in Apple's future for a long time -- even if Daddy does come home in June as promised. Apple leadership has had years to figure out how to handle the worst as it concerned Jobs' health, and had in addition the benefit of the failed 90s ouster to see how not to go about it. Though everyone hopes it's a long time before Jobs' personal worst-case scenario comes to pass, as matters stand we have cause to think that lack of leadership is a worst-case scenario all its own -- a company that cannot, or will not, grow up.