“A new issue of The Daily is being delivered” says the message on my iPad. It’s still the first week of the most anticipated news app for iPad, so consider this a set of first impressions, rather than a full review. Back in October, the New York Times David Carr wrote: “News is the killer app.”

I was hoping The Daily would be that app. It’s not. In the months leading to its Feb. 2 debut, The Daily got a tremendous amount of media attention from writers who hadn’t seen it, but who were brave enough to speculate on its features and benefits.

It reminded me of the wonderful observation, from Richard Reeves I think, that a good journalist could write a story based on two facts, a rumor and a pile of clips.

The speculation was fueled by the personal involvement of News Corp. chief Rupert Murdoch, in close association with Steve Jobs and Apple.

Despite his many successes beyond the newspaper business, in television, satellite news and films, Murdoch has retained his passion for news and newspapers.

Perhaps that passion, and his considerable financial resources, married to Apple’s technology and design genius, could create a new business model for news.

So I was engrossed watching the New York launch of The Daily.

I was hopeful when Murdoch said: “New times demand new journalism.” And, “The iPad demands that we completely reimagine our craft.”

So far, I’m somewhat disappointed, and not just by the fact that the app crashes and I have to restart it virtually every time I use it.

Here’s what I’ve found:

    * There’s not enough that’s compelling. In a week dominated by Egypt and the snowstorm that ate America, there wasn’t much that set The Daily apart from TV and newspaper coverage.
    * It lacks a sense of urgency and the writing is as vanilla as an airline magazine. I agree with Dennis Hetzel, of the Ohio Newspaper Association, who observed, “Many of the stories I’ve read so far seem shallow and not even particularly well written or fresh.”
    * The graphics are wonderful, but nothing I saw in The Daily outstripped CNN’s John King standing in front of the touch sensitive smart board (an iPad on steroids the network calls The Magic Wall), recapping the pitched battles in and around Tahrir Square.

So am I giving up on The Daily?

Absolutely not.

Rupert Murdoch was clear that the intended target isn’t a news junkie like me. He said the target audience is “the growing segment of the population” that’s educated and sophisticated but doesn’t read a national print source or watch national news.

If his editors and designers figure out how to reach that disconnected group, all of us in communication will benefit.

I want to watch The Daily evolve. I don’t want to be like those media critics who were hard on USA Today at the beginning, having missed the point that it wasn’t meant for them.