Agents are very cool - check them out here - and we have some stuff coming in the future which is cooler. Over in the Agents forum Todd posted about the SDK & free agent hosting being opened up to a limited number of Alpha participants.

The Windows Live Agents team is opening a small pilot program where a limited number of developers will be given access to the SDK and provided free hosting for their Agents (bots) that use other Windows Live services.   Since space in the pilot program is limited, the Agents team is providing access to the program based on the description of your project, and what they think would be great Agents.  To request to take part in the pilot program, please take the following steps:

1. The Agents team will be reviewing each request for participation in the pilot program, so please e-mail the following to wla-dev@microsoft.com

       a. What is your agent going to do, what’s a sample scenario of how it will be used, and who is the intended audience for the agent?

       b. Will the Agent include an Activity Window?  If so, what features will be used, if any?

       c. Is the agent being developed for a client?  If so, what is the company?

       d. What Windows Live Services will be used in the Agent?  Please see http://dev.live.com if you need some ideas...

2. Once you’ve been notified of being accepted to the pilot program, you’ll  gain access to the SDK by registering at: http://buddyscript.colloquis.com

3. After filling out the registration information, please send your login name and email address to agentsu@microsoft.com

4. The Agents team will then contact you with the information necessary to take part in the pilot program.

Here are lots of training videos in their blog too.