Twitter and everyone digital are going crazy over Apple’s announcement of the ipad today, as it tries to blur the lines further between an ipod, a netbook and an eReader. But initial reports have received it poorly, labeling it as a “jack of some trades, a master of none”. Here are some of the obvious shortfalls:

No camera- Video calling would be awesome on the ipad. It has a microphone, allowing it to make voip/skype calls over your wifi connection, but then with no camera- skype is out.

No multi-tasking- with the ipad packing some serious processing punch, you would expect to be able to tab between your apps the way you would on a netbook. Mr. Jobs appears to disagree.

No flash- internet browsing on the ipad will feel natural and exciting, but without background processing and flash support will just feel like a super-sized iphone.

Gaming- yes, they look cool and all, but with a world so in love at the community aspect of gaming (xbox live) and interactivity with the Nintendo Wii and Project Natal the ipad will be used in the same way as on the iphone: a gimmicky-time waster.

No USB ports: the inability to upload via USB is a major oversight by Apple. Obviously it is an attempt to limit the piracy of ebooks, music and movies, but it cripples everyone who would want to transfer anything on-the-go. Isn’t that what being portable is all about?

At the end of the day, the ipad will not replace anything like the laptop or smartphone did, it will be complementary to existing technologies that are commonplace in our lives. Hardly revolutionary at the moment, but remember that the initial iphone was slammed when it was first released and we all know how that ended..