In a recent interview with Eurogamer, they said that they have decided not to move in that direction "for the time being", which is a pretty clear indication that they still plan to move in that direction, just not now.
I guess I've basically given up at this point. I loved my internet dragons, but...
A friend of mine talked me into trying City of Heroes. I've seen more active roleplay, and more people staying in character, in that game than I ever did in WoW outside of scheduled RP events. The RPers just organized to say "we'll all do RP stuff on this one server", and created enough momentum that it's become a sort of de-facto RP server. No enforcement or anything, but plenty of active roleplay.
Friendly game, haven't seen any gay-bashing, racism, sexism, or general viciousness in the open channels in a couple of weeks of play. I don't like everything about it, but in terms of "will I have fun if I just log in and start playing", it's been utterly trumping WoW thus far.
And to add insult to injury, they already have a global alias system that lets you talk regardless of faction or server, and everyone uses it, and no one seems to feel that the lack of real names is a horrible limitation.
