Here's the article with the authors opinions. Whether he is correct or not, the most interesting part of his blog post is the graphs.
Article:
http://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/ ... cs/c433hpa
MMO data with subs > 1M
http://users.telenet.be/mmodata/Charts/Subs-1.png
MMO data with subs between 150k-1m
http://users.telenet.be/mmodata/Charts/Subs-2.png
Those are the graphs I found most interesting.
If you look at the last bit of the wow numbers, you can see 2 peaks. I suspect those will be when LK and when Cata were released. We'll likely see another one when MoP is released.... although I doubt back up to 12m.
The author made the point that SWTOR is likely to fail based on the following graph: scifi MMOs aren't popular. I disagree
I'd rather look at the data in a different way.
A) Fantasy lends itself to MMOs better. It's easier to make a Fantasy MMO.
B) Copy the most successful... If you want an easier job, Make a WoW like game.
This means there will be more fantasy MMOs out there.
This doesn't mean there can't be a successful scifi MMO. It just means it'll be harder. If we look at how long it took to make SWTOR, it was harder to make. I'm enjoying SWTOR. What will kill an MMO is not being able to balance leveling with a sustainable endgame experience. Right now it's heavily tipped toward the leveling experience.
In any case, I linked the article if you wish to see the rest. I figured I'd post pics to the parts I found most interesting =]