Between Second Life and World of Craft, about 50 million people exist in entirely virtual worlds. That’s really only counting those “people” be they Anime pixies or Minotaur-wizards that are active - excluding the legion individuals suspended in database limbo awaiting activation by their “players.”
It is interesting how the media - such as the Globe and Mail, conflate Massive Multiplayer Experiences. Second Life is overtly NOT a game - it is a social forum, it makes not a single attempt to emulate a game or provide a game-like experience. World of Warcraft, strictly speaking, is not a game either since there is no victor or loser and no end-state. That said, WoW offers a directed interactive entertainment system which includes a social framework within which to accomplish setting-specific goals.
Why is this distinction important? Because it provides an understanding that there is a massive diversity in the nature of the experiences provided by MMO/Persistent experiences. What’s perplexing to people about Second Life and WoW is not the abstract nature of the experience - it is the novel interface. Wikipedia may be new and perhaps dubious in some people’s imaginings but it isn’t considered a superfluous novelty, its influence cannot be relegated to only those who use it.
Fundamentally, however, wikipedia is an MMO experience just like WoW and Second Life. It is the interface, the method of interaction that makes these things seem like toys or games, not the content delivered.
What seems to be the trend, if Google is any indication, is the convergence of these sorts of “worlds” with ours through various channels of interaction. Augmented reality has been on the minds of interaction engineers for over a decade. The notion of superimposing data on reality or meshing a system with the physical world isn’t particularly new.
I think the primary actors, the drivers for this change, however, aren’t going to be the Palms or the Hewlitt Packards or even the Nokias - though I think they’ll have an important role in standardizing the technology required. The primary movers on this are going to be those companies who deal directly with early adopters of new interactive media - that is, gamers and hardcore webusers.
The next line of portable consoles will likely incorporate some sort of GPS device or other mechanism for tracking some spatial data - much like smartphones come equipped with internal GPS units or at least the capability to interface with them.
Downloadable content and internet awareness in games is a standard feature - in fact most of the hugely successful games are played entirely or predominantly via the internet - World of Warcraft being the frontrunner. Bringing that connectivity to portable devices allows for the networked interaction required for MMOs.
Soon, non-gaming services will piggy back on these devices - Craiglist, Lavalife, Facebook or their Data-Integrated Reality (DIR) equivalents would provide services to users of the gaming hardware.
Soon smartphones will offer similar services, cell providers will likely get deals with various brands to offer exclusive deals.
Soon we shall see headlines talking about the sale of virtual installation works viewable at a specific location only with a Nintendo Connect or PSP 2 or Microsoft XSlate - devices I have only just now invented.