Ok, so iTunes 10 was released just a few weeks ago and I managed to download it and I wanted to give you a glimpse of what I think of it. So far looking at it from start, I really like the new logo, doing away with the CD at the back was a nice idea, that said, not everyone likes the new logo and that is perfectly understandable. I find the newer one a little bit more simple than the last one, but for me simple is good. The new blue background on the logo with a black music scale is a nice touch. Looking at the user interface itself, that's where I sort of wasn't too happy. Firstly the design of the top buttons, which you use to minimize and exit are vertical! Apple talk about awkward?! Not too happy with the way those buttons look. Secondly and this is what really ticked me off, was the fact all the colour was gone from the icons! I generally like software which is colourful and to me it looks more fun to use and easy on the eyes. But now with all the icons grey, the whole of iTunes looks quite dull. The scroller which is required to minimize and maximize volume of what is playing looks different, it will take some time for me to get used to it. Sorry for being picky here, but what I also didn't like was how the check mark boxes look so terrible graphics wise compared to iTunes 9. When you check mark a certain song it used to be a nice blue colour, but now it's a dull grey. 

I also took a look at Ping and thought that it was great, at least for a start. There were a few artists I could follow, but one fact I don't like is how whenever you want to see if your favourite artist updated his/her profile, you have to manually go there, seems to me there is no way to get that on your profile, so it will be much easier. Ping is great for a start and Apple have seemed to grasp the basics of social networking, but the actual topic is kind of plaid, all you can basically talk about is iTunes and music. Spam is also a factor on social networks but Apple has found a way around that by providing an icon to click, which then you can report a certain user for spam. While I was surfing I didn't find any spam at all, so great job Apple! 

I found iTunes 10 to be slightly faster at loading my library than iTunes 9, but other than that user interface was a bit of a disappointment, and Ping... well, it will take some time to be come really intuitive, as Apple should add more features to it. But the fact it has more than 1 million members is astounding. 

Leave your thoughts on iTunes 10 in the comments. More news to come soon.