Since I am here getting all this glorious news i thought i would comment on this one.
My indication of how an MMO is going to do is usually based on one thing and that's the Community Management Team.
How the CM team operates and treats the community is usually a pretty good indication of how the game will be run post release. If the CMs are stand-offish or favor one faction of the community over another it is a pretty good bet that they will be that way post release.
This isn't generally a problem for games that run their own forums, but these days those are few and far between. I've seen good games that have taken a nose dive post launch because the CMs stop trying to lead their communities and assume that now that you have bought the game you will play past the initial 30 days.
If you want to kill a game there really is no faster way then to have a bunch of inept Community Managers who are just there for the cool job title.