Honestly, what Blizzard should do is create a facebook game ala Farmville (I know they're putting in the Tillers, but this would be on steroids) and let people who just want to gather and craft use that kind of set-up to level up crafting skills. Make it an entirely different type of WoW account, charge something like, I dunno, 5-10 bucks a month, and let people just be totally peaceful crafter/farmers without ever having to have a real character in the game. Let them put stuff on the AH for a given server for gold they could then use to improve their farm more, and there you go.

They would get a TON of new players for WoW who love mindless games like Farmville, and people who wanted to play the normal way could still do that. I have several friends who would totally do it but who won't touch an MMO with a 20 meter pole.