A minor point- My understanding has always been that the intent of the original site was that it would provide a way to exchange virtual cards for the game Magi

A minor point- My understanding has always been that the intent of the original site was that it would provide a way to exchange virtual cards for the game Magic The Gathering Online, and not the (related) physical game. That is, "Online" was part of the name of the game, not a descriptor of where the exchange was. I don't know enough about MTGO to know if a third party exchange was even possible, but it would be worth looking into if someone was trying to establish if the site ever actually did anything.