Push No Pushover For Apple, But So What?

Now comes word that Apple has sought out beta testers for an Associated Press iPhone application with push functionality and, like all things Apple, its ecosystem is abuzz with anticipation.

If it works, and push becomes a working part of the iPhone 3.0 world, it could have a major impact on software development surrounding Apple's smartphone technology. That could provide additional spark to what is arguably Apple's most successful product ever. But don't count your chickens before they're pushed.

Apple itself already has concerns about push on the iPhone, and justifiably so. With e-mail, the technology consumes battery life (by as much as an hour or two during the course of a day.) And Apple's effort at delivering push on its MobileMe offering was an out-and-out disaster when that over-the-air technology launched last year. Some improvements have been made since then, but it's still not unheard of for data that's entered into a database online to be lost into the ether when "pushed" to the iPhone using MobileMe.

Some are speculating Apple will use the same technology it used with MobileMe to support third-party applications. If that's the case, cross your fingers.

Push support for third-party apps will be nice. But so is unlimited SMS text messaging, which AT&T offers on iPhones -- and SMS is instantaneous and works right now. In fact, by using a service like you can find at Pingie.com, combined with SMS, you can have Associated Press headlines and links delivered over-the-air right now in the form of text messages. AP provides RSS feeds, and Pingie can do the rest.

Pingie isn't perfect, but it works.

Eventually, Apple will support push on third-party iPhone software. But it hardly needs that technology to do brisk iPhone business, and millions of users have managed to do without it until now.