I agree with OP (Great Onizuka!). I think that an omogeneous server is a good thing, even if you play most with people from your country. It means players logged at every hours, markets full or rare stuffs, new possible friends to meet, and so on.
When Square Enix made an EU World (Ragnarok) many european players decided to not to move there, because there won't be any advantage. With Data Centers the situation is different, but what proposed by Onizuka could be a good test, so that people could really see "how much they lag", and then take a more reasonable decision (even if they have already decided to choose a close Data Center).