64-bits programming

What's the best place to start my journey on the 64-bits tour than over here at goog old CPU Central. It's actually great to come back to see some familiar names although I've been pretty off the last years (studying and family etc). Hi everybody, hope everybody is doing well over here

Down to the business: I'm going to do my final job on my education with some 64-bits programming, testing and analysing. Programming links and tips are all over the net, but then there's the question about reliable information about how the world is going to adopt the new technology... when will software companies in general start porting their old applications to 64-bits and how important is it to start building new applications with the new technology?

Those are some of the questions I intend to try answering in the next two months apart from converting servers and benchmarking for speed and reliablility etc.
If anyone has any tips on good links or personal experiences / wisdom, please share it with me

Since the company I am doing the research for is a department of a rather big company ("With close to 15 000 experts and annual net sales about EUR 1.5 billion, we are the largest IT services company in the Nordic countries.") I'm not so much interested in claims made by people that can't back it up like "Nobody will ever need more than 4 GB RAM" or "You're stupid if you even considerate not porting"... I believe that you get the idea of why