What a relief.
It's positive that OpenSim and Second Life continue to part ways, not only server-side but client-side. As noted in the article, this will have favorable consequences for OpenSim, and as for Second Life, whatever it was going to be all along, it's going to continue to be moving forward. That is to say, the expectation that somehow Second Life and OpenSim were all part of one developing integrated metaverse was always a problematic hope.
This latest development establishes clearer technological boundaries on which to base development decisions. We've been kept on the edge of our seats wondering about an OpenSim viewer, and the Phoenix team has come through. Likewise, we've been waiting for the shoe to drop at Linden Labs concerning the use of their viewer with OpenSim and the shoe has fallen.
For some, the crossover capabilities formed a kind of grace period, which is now gone. Yet with these developments one can choose a viable path in OpenSim or in Second Life without undue anxiety that one or the other is going to make the critical technological change that ruins an investment, at least in the short run. This is much better than all the prior speculation and uncertainty.
I suspect this may all flair up again when the day comes that fully browser-based viewers become available, since they may be able to allow universal access just as Web browsers do now for websites. It seems however that for now we have reached a new and important plateau.