Interesting how perspective can lead to totally different conclusions. In Russel Carroll's article, he argues that the online gaming experience is not all what it is cracked up to be and that he would be just as happy without it (paraphrasing a bit). IMHO, he could not be more wrong.

If it were not for online gaming, I would not own an XBOX 360. Or at least, I would not play one. I play Call of Duty Online almost to the point of excluding the other titles I have (GoW, Rainbow Six:LV, and others). I love playing COD3 online. I have played about 30 minutes of the actual game. I don't know anyone else while I am online. I just like competing and racking up kills. COD is just hard enough that there is a difference between good and bad players, but not so much that I felt overwhelmed when I started playing. It has a few flaws, but without the oline experience, I would not play on the console much at all.