Oh, I think you misunderstood me. I didn't mean "FFXIV will never be anywhere near what FFXI is" in the sense of FFXI is a better game. I wasn't trying to compare the two games, as to me they are really two different era's of MMO.
What I was saying was that SE has a lot of experience in the world of MMOs, to waive off requests for some kind of interesting open world content with "this is not FFXI" just does a disservice to a player base that really just want to be able to have more experiences together in the beautiful world Yoshida and his team have built.
By all means, FFXIV is absolutely a success and Yoshida came in and cleaned up after Wada, Tanaka & Co fumbled. I have an absolute respect and admiration for Yoshida for his work turning an absolute failed MMO, into a critically reviewed success. I just think his swagger gets ahead of him when it comes to answering questions regarding open world content.