They have not mentioned it , but they are going to do stress test and open 5-10 worlds .

Assuming that typical realm has the ability to support 10k-20k players , I would say they will be about 50~200k in the test.
You are read more about the schedule Here
Remember as reminded by shojikun , all the details from game beta are NDA .

Currently hogging PappaRich's WiFi.... still very slow....60kbps... wtf UNIFI!!! Orz

o_O still got? if you wanna buy it.. sure go ahead, can still use the code when FFXIV ARR launched....

But no, is not b2p like GW2, is p2p still.
Just to tell you that SE did annoucne the merchandise to be destroyed. So if still available grab if you want to save some bucks when FFXIV ARR launched. Because i can forsee it will be around RM140++

There will be many phases.. This phase 1 is close Beta,  every close beta in other MMO is hard to get in.  I think Legacy member and ppl that was in Alpha can join this phase 1.  Correct me if I'm wrong.

the lore looks good, anyone planning to follow the naming conventions?

lol, there will be Auction House, is called Market Board, but without the bidding. so no bidding, i straight buy/sell only.

As stated by SE representative , the FF14 IP is solely owned by Square Enix . If the game fails , it would SE 's very own loss.

They do not have share the profit with the other investors , therefore the game will likely stay subscription model because they believe it is for the best for the long term game development.
As for subscription games, you are indeed correct except one .  WOW which still has over 10 millions active subscribing player ( although it lost several hundreds k recently )

Subscription model is still the best for the health of the game and the wallet of the gamers . These F2P games have offered too much Pay-to-win perks for the guys who are willing to spend .

It will always be used as a reference book for the ' successful subscribing mmorpg ', or the most successful MMORPG in history in general . On business perspective, it has generated so much income for blizzard and made them the online Games Giant throne. 

Just look at Naoki , how often he mentioned the game in his interview. He had to be awared of its presence as well .

There are ups and downs of course  but it is still way far ahead of any other existing mmo .
The decrease in players do happen to every game, but for a game that has 10 millions solid subscribing players ,
a few hundred K loss is not nearly enough to threaten Blizzard's position in the market in general.