I plan to live forever. So far, so good.

Microsoft ESP is a visual simulation platform that brings immersive games-based technology to training and learning decision support, and research and development modeling for government and commercial organizations.

Simulations built on ESP can engage users in immersive experiences with very realistic land, sea, and air environments making them ideal tools for training, evaluating, and preparing personnel for optimal performance in the real world.

From the press release:

As a platform technology, Microsoft ESP provides a PC-based simulation engine, a comprehensive set of tools, applications programming interfaces, documentation to support code development, content integration and scenario-building capabilities, along with an extensive base of world content that can be tailored for custom solutions. Partners and developers can add structured experiences or missions, content such as terrain and scenery, scenarios, and hardware devices to augment existing solutions, or they can build and deploy new solutions that address the mission-critical requirements of their customers.

To support high-fidelity, dynamic, 3-D immersive experiences, Microsoft ESP includes geographical, cultural, environmental and rich scenery data along with tools for placing objects, scenery and terrain customization, object activation, special effects, and environmental controls including adjustable weather. Realistic land, sea and air environments enable fully immersive experiences that can be used for the following:

• Flight training and rehearsal. Includes cockpit familiarization, checklists and cockpit flows, and capability-based training such as aerial refueling and basic sortie.
• Preparedness and decision-making. Includes experiences such as allowing a pilot to pre-fly a new route or become more familiar with new terrain, approach patterns and weather patterns.
• Research and development modeling. Allows a user to visualize ideas, create mockups of cockpits or instrument panels, design specs in 3-D, and evaluate runway configurations or lighting schemes.

Simulations built on the Microsoft ESP platform can take advantage of an extensive set of capabilities to create dynamic, immersive environments, including the following:

• Configurable weather model. Includes user-adjustable weather conditions, limitless variations using four cloud types, wind-speed and directional controls, visibility effects and precipitation modeling, or use of near-real-time weather from an external data source feed.
• Extensive scene generation and scenery support. Has support for up to five seasons including hard winter, continuous time of day, night textures and scenery support including automatic fill-in.
• After-Action Review. Allows for effective performance playback and analysis.
• Support of standardized data sources. Supports Digital Elevation Model data, vector data, WGS-84 datum, METAR weather data, dynamic objects, Dolby 5.1 Surround Sound and others
• Multiplayer functionality and Internet support including Voice over IP. Allows up to 30 people to interact around the world using a peer-to-peer broadband connection

Also, regarding pricing:

Microsoft ESP 1.0 will be available for purchase on Jan. 1, 2008, via Microsoft’s Volume Licensing price list. Client licenses for Microsoft ESP 1.0 will have an estimated list price of $799 (U.S.) per machine, and the Microsoft ESP software development kit will have an estimated list price of $99 (U.S.).

More info on the official Microsoft ESP site.

Microsoft has begun the public beta test of Popfly, a mashup tool for its Silverlight cross-browser, cross-platform, streaming media technology. Company CEO Steve Ballmer made the announcement at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco on Thursday.

Popfly, which was introduced in alpha test form by Microsoft in May, is built on Silverlight. It’s designed to enable non-technical users to easily create mashups – quickly-built composite applications that combine data and functions from more than one application on a single Web page – on Silverlight.

For instance, Popfly could be used to “build a Web page for a club or organization, such as a soccer team page that would include a schedule, photos and videos from past games, [and] directions to upcoming matches,” according to one Microsoft statement.

Other technologies and application components that can be used in building Popfly mashups include Microsoft’s Virtual Earth and Live Search services. Advanced users can also use it with Visual Studio Express, another Microsoft statement said.

Many industry observers see Silverlight as a direct competitor to Adobe’s Flash technology. Whether it will displace Flash, however, is far from clear. However, if the popularity that Microsoft claims from the alpha test is any indication, it could give Flash a run for its money.

“In a little over five months since the private Popfly alpha, we’ve seen the number of users grow from about 100 to over 50,000,” S. Somasegar, corporate vice president of Microsoft’s Developer Division, said in a blog post Thursday.

The company has also partnered with social networking sites, including Facebook and Twitter, so that their features can be incorporated into Popfly mashups, he added.

But Flash is well ensconced on users’ desktops, and Microsoft has a long ways to go yet to prove that Silverlight will supersede it. Some observers are still skeptical.

“I think Popfly is really cool like Yahoo Pipes, I just don’t know if anyone’s going to use it,” said John Battelle, one of the Web 2.0 Summit’s organizers.

No final ship date has been announced for Popfly. Microsoft shipped version 1.0 of Silverlight last month. The Popfly beta, which requires Silverlight 1.0, is available here.

The final version of Silverlight has recently been released, and it now comes with Linux support as well.