Hmm...not sure if anyone has posted this, but I read this on a recent Planetgamecube mailbag.  Everything may not be as finalized as everyone seems to think.

"Woah, hold on there, buddy. I don't recall Nintendo saying anything about their online plans for Wii, other than the WiiConnect24 name and a few hints of what was to come. To assume that Nintendo will copy the DS online model over to Wii as-is would be getting ahead of things.

The initial setup for DS online makes sense from a casual gamer's point of view. Friend codes are a way to ensure that the person you were playing against online was someone you know. That's important from a safety and security point of view, which is one of Nintendo's main priorities for anything to do with online. Of course, since the hardcore population has been spoiled by Xbox Live, people that know their way around online gaming see DS online lacking in many areas. Nintendo knows this, and are looking to improve the service on the handheld side of things.

For Wii, Nintendo will almost definitely have a new setup for online gaming on the console. They'll need to have some kind of setup for the Virtual Console service, for starters. Friend codes might be out, too (see the related link in the above news story). WiiConnect24 is one of those things Nintendo didn't tell us about that a lot of people assumed that they were going to. For now, we're still going to need to wait to get those questions answered.

Another bonus answer: It will be. The majority of Wii games use it, so it makes sense that it'll come with the system. What else they're going to pack in with it is the real question."

You guys can check it out here...6th question... http://www.planetgamecube.com/mailbagArt.cfm?artid=11595