Pocket Picks Round-up: 18th June - HTC Desire owners being messed around, Google Docs is expanding, Sony launches Music Unlimited on Android, iOS 5 will be stripped down for old iPhones

As reported on a number of home console websites this week, the delicate balance between journalists and PR was on display for all to see as sites were threatened with boycotts for giving poor reviews to Duke Nukem Forever.

But gaming wasn’t the only area to witness a public relations disaster in the last seven days.

Indeed, if anyone wants a lesson in how not to handle software updates to a handset, then they couldn’t do much worse than take a look at HTC UK and its handling of the Desire Gingerbread upgrade.

Unlike the Duke Nukem example, this one was more a case of speaking too soon and finding itself having to hastily backtrack.

What made the backtrack worse was that HTC UK then had to clarify the backtrack, due to customers (rightly) being a little narked at the absence of any explanation.

Three solid days of bad publicity on tech websites for the Taiwanese manufacturer, thus, ensued.

The good news for Desire owners is that - yes - Gingerbread will be coming to the handset.

Initial reports from HTC UK that the update just couldn’t fit on the phone’s memory caused a mighty outcry on the Facebook page from customers feeling betrayed by the company.

To work around these storage issues, HTC engineers are removing some apps from the phone in an effort to squeeze both SenseUI and Gingerbread onto the machine.

No projected date as to when this will happen, but given that it seemed the company was ready to give up just a few days ago, it’s unlikely we’ll hear any more about this for at least another month.

It appears, predictably, that some of the new features coming in iOS 5 will not be accessible on the previous generation iPhone 3GS, if the developer beta doing the rounds is any indication.

On the bright side, most of iOS 5 seems to be intact, which means there’s the Notification Center, Lock screen widgets, and full Twitter integration for sharing stuff.

If you clapped, hollered, and whooped at the announcement of the extra photo-editing functions or Reader for the Safari browser, though, you will be disappointed.

While it may be annoying for 3GS owners to see their model miss out on a few things, let’s not forget that it only remains the second-latest iteration of iPhone because Apple didn’t - for once - reveal a new version at WWDC.

Chrome notebooks have begun launching around the world, which means Google is understandably cranking up the development of its flagship cloud office suite, Google Docs, to ensure customers don’t get Word withdrawal.

This focus also extends to the Android version of GDocs, which the company has revealed will be seeing a significant facelift in the near future.

Firstly, the engineers are planning on changing the app from a ‘wrapper’ (putting the website in a mobile-friendly shell) to a stand-alone application.

This app is also expected to include the ability to edit documents offline, as well as ‘cloud print' - allowing tasks to be sent to a printer via the Internet.

Now that WWDC has been and gone, rumours of the iPhone 5 appearing in September have started to gather pace, with the latest suggesting the handset has entered the final testing phase.

This means that, should you spot an Apple employee walking around Cupertino in California, chances are that they’re going to be carrying one disguised as an earlier model (if history is anything to go by).

That isn’t a free invitation to mug them, though.

As usual, the company itself is remaing quiet on what exactly to expect from this next iteration of the successful smartphone, which has led to rumour mills conjuring up everything from 8-megapixel cameras to a curved glass back.

We’d be amazed if it didn’t at least feature the latest Apple mobile chip, the dual-core A5, that we last saw whirring away inside the iPad 2. Although, this being Apple, we wouldn’t want to bet on it.

Sony’s streaming music service (often incorrectly called Qriocity, after the system that powers it), Music Unlimited, launched on Android this week, bringing the formally PC- and PS3-only service to mobiles for the first time.

Music Unlimited is a Spotify competitor and allows for the streaming of music files from thousands of artists onto your phone for a monthly fee.

Given the number of security issues the Japanese corporation has had over the past few months, the service is currently subject to some rather generous joining benefits, with American PS3 owners able to sign up to a whopping six months gratis.

Android users that weren’t affected by the PSN security breach can still grab a month’s free subscription from the website, with the following month’s starting at a well-priced £3.99.