I don't understand why so many are grossed out. It is just a rubber cover on the cable that is made to look like an umbilical cord. I can understand if it was an actual umbilical cord.
I guess getting my undergrad in biology and seeing everything possible thing one can see, this is it the very low spectrum of gross too me.
It's not particularly gross (believe me it can't hold a candle to the real thing.) It looks like something you'd use as some sort of practical joke. Like you find someone with an iPhone and plug it in and then they look at it and think, "Holy s**t something is trying to eat my iPhone! Kill it kill it!!!"