I think one thing is for sure, that any change will be met with a healthy does of complaining and whining. Just look at the changes that FB does constantly tweaking the interface angering its members. Many times it seems to be a decent change but that doesn't stop people.
Folks are funny, they clamor for stuff to be updated but when things change, particularly on stuff that they're used too and like, the complaints fly.
I think iOS is dated and in some respect restrictive compared to the competition, so Apple needs to do some things to update iOS and make it more inline with its competitors.