Did you read the article though? All those other MMOs talk about more player-in-world freedom, which is just a natural progression. These devs are talking about

Did you read the article though? All those other MMOs talk about more player-in-world freedom, which is just a natural progression. These devs are talking about taking the role of world-gods that MMO companies are normally restricted to paid employees, and turning it over to "players" to run and manage their own servers. It's like all those other MMOs were promising greater freedom on one axis, and often delivering it, while this is offering a whole new axis.