My initial thoughts about ICS were of concern: concern that it wouldn't offer enough that was new in order to entice new users and encourage existing users to stay.

Those initial thoughts were based on the media coverage surrounding the launch but after installing a custom, alpha ROM on my trusty old HTC Desire I have had the chance to see if they were correct.

I'm sorry to say that my initial fears are confirmed.

The emperors new clothes

Using ICS feels like using Android with a new skin. Some may say that is good as it means you are instantly familiar with the system despite the redesign and any changes. Others will argue that this creates a problem, I fall into this latter group.

I like new look to the GMail app and the updated browser but that isn't enough. ICS is portrayed as having a more consistent UI but individual core apps differ significantly - never mid thirs party apps.

I remarked upon the similarity with Windows Phone 7 in places but we all know that I mean the new People application. I'm sure there have been more inconsistent UIs but, right now, I can't think of one.

For every positive there is a negative; the visual multitasking with swipe to close apps is very nice but why does Android still not have smart dialing?

A sideways scrolling app dock where apps and widgets are separate is just a bit of polish. Resizable widgets has been in third party launchers for ages. Drag and drop to create folders is direct from iOS.

Sorry Google but this just doesn't do it for me.

So, an exploit has been discovered on the Siri servers which means that enterprising developers could hook in from devices other than the iPhone 4S. There has even been talk of using the service from non-Apple devices such as Android.

Come on, really?

There is a massive jump from discovering a potential opening to actually getting it working (a UUID for an iPhone 4S for a start but these can easily be blocked by Apple) and do people seriously think that Apple isn't going to close this down as a massive priority.

Siri is the big differentiator for the iPhone 4S and, consequently, they have effectively said it will not roll out on other iOS devices (couched in the terms that there are no plans to). If Apple aren't even openeing up Siri to their own devices there is no way in the world that they are going to let anyone get away with free-loading off the service on a competitors device even accounting for the UUID requirement.

Do we expect an announcement from Apple very soon that they have fixed the exploit or will they quietly patch it in which case any announcement will come from those "enterprising developers" when they can no longer gain access to the Siri back-end.

Move along, nothing to see here.

One thing we know: the leaks were genuine and that worried me.

There was no way I was going to be up at 3am to watch the live webcast so didn't get caught up in the pomp and ceremony but I did make sure that the first thing I did was check live blogs and some hands on footage.

Gingerbread was such a low key update to Froyo and from the end user perspective was quite underwhelming - ICS needed to do much better.

As I have commented elsewhere, ICS visually is largely Honeycomb on a phone and I was worried that it wouldn't offer anything really new.

Size IS important

It's clear to see that Google is betting the family silver on large screens - a good differentiator to the iPhone. Resizable widgets, magazine style layout of contacts, two line message preview in Gmail etc. Although it's been said there should be no reason this won't run on any Gingerbread device I wouldn't expect anything with less than a 4 inch screen to get it - the amount of information on screen will be reduced.

One word I've seen used a lot in connection with ICS is 'enhancements' which, to me conjours up images of minor changes. ICS promises something new but in general just gives us a Honeycomb coat of paint.

One thing I immediately thought is that the UI in certain apps is starting to look a bit like Windows Phone 7 in certain areas, anyone else?

Say cheese!

Just as with the iPhone the camera app has got a lot of love - boy, did it need it - but even then we hear reports that the built-in filters are unimpressive leaving us still waiting for the Android Instagram app.

Multi-tasking has been given the Honeycomb treatment with a few nice touches but again will perform best on a larger screen.

Catch-up

Android fan boys have been accusing Apple of playing catch-up with the iPhone but there are a few instances where Android is doing exactly the same: folder creation by dragging one shortcut on to another is directly lifted from iOS and you have to wonder if Apple have a patent on that.

Much was made by some about full OS level hardware acceleration in ICS but I haven't seen any reference to that in the live blogs (is it in there?) This too is playing catch-up with the iPhone.

In summary

ICS is a refresh that Android badly needed but is it enough? The OS seems to have a new design mandate with context sensitive buttons at the bottom of apps but is this consistent? Will developers be encouraged to adopt this policy to avoid a fragmented experience and will they, therefore, be shipping different versions of their API so that apps don't then look out of place on older versions of Android?

ICS is definitely an overdue evolution but not a massive one in my eyes.

I may have never personally owned an Apple product (although that is likely to change in the near future) but there is no denying the passion they instill which, no doubt, stems from the passion with which they were created. Steve's passion.

Without Apple the world would be a different place: Microsoft would not have been driven to develop Windows as much as it has without MacOS; there would likely have been no Zune (and consequently Windows Phone 7 would probably have been completely different) without the iPod; and Google may not have invested in Android were there no iPhone.

Even if you have never used an Apple product you are reaping the benefits of at least one due to the wide reaching influence Apple has exerted on the modern world.

I had always been quite anti, resenting the tie-in to iTunes and the App Store but the release of the iPad caused me to begin re-evaluating how I looked at the iOS ecosystem. Having been a staunch Tablet PC enthusiast ever since seeing a prototype before their release I always appreciated the value that a tablet could provide - it was just unfortunate that Windows could never match my expectations or the potential of a tablet product. By completely re-thinking the experience Apple instantly made tablets cool and did the one thing Microsoft or its OEMs never could: strike a chord with the consumer.

When my wife purchased an iPad 2 earlier this year my re-evaluation was complete and, while iTunes may not be the best piece of software going, I came to appreciate the iOS ecosystem for what it really is. The likelihood is that I will now get an iPhone 4S as my next device.

So, I say thank you Steve Jobs for your vision and passion and may you rest in peace. Your legacy will live on for many years to come.

There's no doubt many will be disappointed that there is no iPhone 5 but the iPhone 4S combined with iOS5 and iCloud is a serious heavyweight device.

It is a shame that there isn't a bigger screen or a new body design but the new processor and graphics more than make up for it.

And then there's the new camera...

I am increasingly cursing the camera on my trusty old Desire - the quality is seriously lacking and cannot do justice to anything I shoot. You should not have to retouch and shrink photos just to remove artifacts caused by a poor sensor.

I'm not far off due for a phone upgrade so being able to effectively get a new camera in your pocket at the same time is quite compelling.

If Siri is that accurate then it will be a game changer. I hope it handles UK accents better than some voice recognition apps in the past.

So, will I switch from Android to Apple even without an iPhone 5? I just might.

I just posted this over at Facebook:

The hype is over and the echoes of an over-enthusiastic applause, fueled by the moment, have died.

After the party has finished and they've all gone home, the stray plates and leftovers have been cleared away and we are left to ponder on what just happened. That is just what I have been doing.

I love the social web and the potential it holds to connect us, to help us discover and to learn. If it didn't I wouldn't blog about it. Ever since joining Twitter nearly 5 years ago I recognised the impact social media could have.

The idea of feeding more of our lives to a stream on the web may seem creepy to some but I relish the opportunity.

In "real life" I don't have a big social circle and don't keep in touch with old school friends so, in a way, the Facebook of the past was a bit lost on me.

Friending someone often felt false so I stopped doing it which is why I have less than 60 people in my list. How many of those do I actually 'know' in real life? Probably about half.

This last week has revolutionised how I can use Facebook. Subscriptions mean that I can connect with people I don't really know without having to feel guilty; and, I'm sure I'm not alone.

These latest changes give Facebook a whole new lease of life and this is where other networks have failed in the past. I think of the service as the Madonna of social: always ready to re-invent itself with a new image that better suits the times.

I have spoken a few times recently about the "social norm" - an expectation by the public of what any given product or service should offer; Facebook meets, and often surpasses, the social norm.

It has been a gradual process but the world is learning to live online with all that it entails; what our social networks do now would have been unthinkable just a few years ago - at least for most. As the acceptance of online life has grown so our networks have needed to accommodate these broadening horizons and no-one does this better than Facebook.

Mark Zuckerberg may be called naive by some for expecting us all to share our lives in blissful ignorance but 800 million Facebook users illustrates that people do want to share or else they wouldn't be here.

I believe we are not just seeing a change in functionality but a shift in ethos - a gradual change in our behaviour that integrates technology with our deep-set social instincts.

Social is not a new phenomenon, we have all been social since our ancestors gathered in caves in order to survive. With some exceptions, we crave human contact and interaction and enjoy the feeling of being part of something larger than ourselves - that feeling we belong.

We go to pubs and clubs or sporting events to be part of the crowd, we watch TV and have our water cooler moments where we can share a common interest if for just a brief time. Technology is reaching the point where it can enhance and even, to a degree, replicate these scenarios; anyone who can connect us in this way is akin to the skilled party host choosing their guests to ensure a good mix and an enjoyable evening.

Facebook has become the host of the biggest party of all and I think it's time I started accepting the invitations.

I'm sat here on holiday with a very poor mobile signal which has caused my participation on social networks to be virtually non-existant.

It is frustrating as I would have liked to keep more up to date with my followers both on Google+ for conversation and on Twitter especially now that the new football season has started here in England.

Times like this make you realise that you must prioritise your social participation based on the resources available - in this case connectivity.

It is against this backdrop that I now see that Twitpic founder Noah Everett has launched a new Twitter competitor in the form of heello.com. While he states that the timing of the launch was purely serendipitous, coinciding as it did with the launch of Twitter's image upload service which could threaten Twitpic's very survival, you have to wonder if there is any sense in launching yet another status update network.

Noah states that Twitpic has a loyal base of users but how many of those are only using it because it is the default option in certain clients?

When talking about loyalty, you can't hope to compete with what Twitter has achieved especially in it's dark days when we saw the fail whale more than the Twitter home page.

Even during those times people remained loyal to Twitter as they had invested in the service and its ecosystem. Despite the problems Twitter faced none of the extremely credible competitors (identity.ca, Plurk etc.) could establish a foothold and entice users away.

If competitors are unable to take advantage during the bad times then it will be virtually impossible now that Twitter finally seems to be getting its act together. Old Twitter has finally gone and we now have the new tabs designed to easier display activity (favourites, retweets, new follows, etc.) around both your own tweets and those of others in real time to keep things fresh and aid discovery of popular topics/tweets and new people.

For all of the debate about whether Google+ could cause problems for Twitter, this loyalty displayed by its users coupled with a much needed iteration of the product should dispell these fears. We must also not forget that the use case and behavior differs greatly between the services.

There may be a degree of overlap but Google+ is not a direct competitor with Twitter (or Facebook). The differences ensure that the services co-exist but releasing a direct competitor to an established service is asking for trouble.

When Google+ was first released to field trial Google announced that search wasn't ready and they didn't want to release a half baked effort.

Since then everyone keeps repeatedly bitching that search is not present, asking: how could Google release a product with such core functionality missing?

Well, it's still in field trial folks (albeit a big one) and nothing had been released! Because G+ is so solid we tend to forget this and forget that the trial is probably far larger, and creating far more data, than Google imagined.

If G+ gets opened to the public and there is still no search then we can complain. Until then, let's put down the torches and pitchforks and keep providing the feedback.

Dave Winer posted ( http://r2.ly/c6jz ) that Google+ Circles are bound to fail because it is human nature to start with the best intentions when organising and categorising our data/friends etc. but, after a while, we become lax and this falls by the wayside.

This may well be the case elsewhere but Google+ has a key difference: you are made to add a new friend to a Circle when you start following them. This is THE WAY you follow people - it even says so on the site.

Admittedly, as I have already said elsewhere, people could cop out and just put all their friends in the "Following" circle but being made to think about that choice at the very beginning makes us far more likely to stick with it on Plus in my opinion.

The amount of press generated about Google+ is staggering. This is the biggest buzz about any social product in a long time.

Comment is ranging from the very favourable to the hyper-critical with some saying they love it whilst others claim it is a mess of ideas that lacks direction.

Is it a Facebook killer? No, and I'd doubt it was ever supposed to be. Besides, how can you get nearly 700 million people to move when they are perfectly happy where they are?

Some have criticised the invite only launch calling it damaging and embarrassment, others have said it is a cunning PR move.

Personally, I think the staggered launch can work in Google's favour: create a buzz and keep 'em hungry. Just so long as it doesn't go on too long so that frustration sets in.