Apple this week enlisted the services of the Associated Press and called upon many of its iPhone developers to help stress test its new Push Notification service slated for delivery in iPhone 3.0.

In an email sent to iPhone developers, Apple wrote, “We have selected a pre-release version of the Associated Press app for iPhone OS 3.0 to create a high-volume test environment for our servers.”

The test application, which requires iPhone OS 3.0 beta 5, will be active over the next week and will then expire. During that time, “AP will be sending a high-volume of real news alerts” to give Apple an opportunity to monitor how well the system works and what optimizations can be made.

Originally planned to arrive last fall, Apple’s Push Notification system was delayed after the company realized that it had underestimated the demand third parties would make of the push system.

After realizing its original design would not adequately serve the needs of developers or users, Apple pulled the plug and returned to the proverbial drawing board to create a supportable system that was up to the task of serving alerts to the audience of tens of millions of iPhone and iPod touch users (a smart move actually, as a faulty launch would have served to push things back even further).