I think there was something called the living world, ages ago, when I did play it.

Regardless of what it was named, it was a time-limited set of story events.To my recollection, it was my first experience with a FOMO-inducing mechanic in a game. It is what caused me to bounce off the game completely and say I want nothing to do with this.

I can understand why such a design choice might be made - the scarcity of it pulls the large portion of the player base all into the same areas and same questlines at the same time. It can make the world feel far more populated. But… So does any new content, if to a lesser degree.