If anybody IS playing WildStar and reads this in the immediate future, you can get a free mount while keys last here:
http://www.mmorpg.com/giveaways.cfm/offer/639/Wildstar-Bandit-Carver-Mount-Giveaway.html
...but they're going fast (and apparently they're on their 2nd batch so there may be more at some point).
You are a person of deep faith if you have faith in Star Citizen. I don't even consider that to be an MMORPG even if they are claiming it will be very type of game on the market simultaneously. They're design is even more ambitious than a typical modern MMORPG, with less funding, and with possibly a lot of problems if the latest dirt is to believed (I personally don't care either way - if it comes out and is good I'll play it).
I don't think the old MMORPGs made a mistake with group content - it's how the genre existed. It was niche. It worked. It didn't have a bazillion players. And that was ok. There are some styles of games, like grand stragegy, that aren't for everybody. That doesn't mean you dumb them down and tweak them and ruin them to get bigger numbers.
There can be no challenging solo content in a game designed for the least common denominator. In an ideal class based/role based/group based MMORPG, there can be no challenging solo content because your healers and support have no chance - classes aren't equal for solo in a really good group-based game where the idea is to group and support each other. Instead you get the watered down for dummies MMORPGs we have now with tons of solo - and where every class can do everything and the roles are barely there.
The other thing is that the whole idea of having group based content is to NOT solo. Players and humans tend to take the easy way out and if solo is viable, they'll do that, which kind of kills the point. Extremely limited solo that's horrifically inefficient as something to do when you only have a few minutes to logon or need something to do while LFG - maybe. But I think for the health of such a game, and due to the fact that in a truly class-based/group/role-based game not all classes can solo equally, you need to prod people towards grouping.
People who want to group would have no problem with this. People who claim they don't have time shouldn't play MMORPGs (at least not end game or serious content), and those that want to solo over grouping or with optional grouping have no lack of crappy options.
So, I don't agree. I'm hoping, and expecting, that beyond Pantheon (I don't see any MMORPG working work a crap in Unity), some other dev with more oomph will make a stab at the older MMORPGs style, and it'll work, because there are so many more people online these days that it's far more possible now. Well, one can dream.