Even more interesting, "Spanner" is English for "something that spans", as in a database spanning the world.

Maybe it's a bit snarky, but I really don't see how you can read into something like that. It reminds me of the following Jack Handy quote:

Maybe in order to understand mankind, we have to look at the word itself: "Mankind". Basically, it's made up of two separate words - "mank" and "ind". What do these words mean? It's a mystery, and that's why so is mankind. - Jack Handy