Push Notification Remains MIA in iPhone 3.0

The single most spoken about and demonstrated feature of iPhone 3.0 software from Tuesday’s launch event — push notification — remains absent from the beta release distributed to developers, with no indication thus far forthcoming from Apple when it will become available.

Scott Forstall, Apple’s Senior VP for iPhone Software, spent more than half an hour Tuesday talking about push notification and ringmastered a dog and pony show involving developers from more than half a dozen companies, who sought to demonstrate how push notification is, in Forstall’s words, “ready to go.”

And yet, it’s apparently not.

Cult of Mac confirmed Wednesday night with Bay Area-based iPhone developers from RF.com, whose WiFi telephony application is anxiously awaiting the particulars on how push notification will be implemented in 3.0, that push is nowhere to be found. No mention of push in the SDK readme file, nor in release notes, no information about the existence of the revamped server architecture Forstall described on Tuesday.

Congratulations, Apple on finally delivering cut, copy and paste, voice recorder, landscape view for email and other apps. Congratulations on having good intentions with respect to push notification, but where is it?