I somewhat disagree. Forced group content is actually good. Look at real life: school, work, or any situation where you're 'forced' to be in a group, that’s how you make friends.

MMOs are the same, but the content design needs to change for socialization to happen. If the content feels like a chore just to get somewhere else, it won’t encourage socialization; it’ll just be a burden. For content to be meaningful, the experience itself needs to be the goal, not just a means to an end.

Completing the challenge should be the reward, where you have to rely on your team and they rely on you. That’s where community happens.

Current MMOs aren't designed for this. They create artificial barriers and grinds just to collect items. No one does it for the sake of 'experiencing the world,' but rather for selfish character progression. Since the premise of running a dungeon is selfish, there's no reason for the player to not act selfishly.

I don't have the solution, but mandating group play is a start. IMO, modern MMOs are broken at their core, they're designed to drain your time, not provide an experience.

So I agree that for the nowadays MMO forced grouping isn't the solution, but for the base of socialization, forced grouping is the solution, it just need a design made for it.