It seems that indeed there is a lot of confusion going on.
To start with - very few monitors can actually reproduce AdobeRGB colors (some expensive Eizos can and maybe top of the line NEC Spectravision, there may be some more). Most monitors do well if they come close to reproducing sRGB.
When working in AdobeRGB, you do not see AdobeRGB colors - if they are out of the monitor gamut (but still within gamut for AdobeRGB).
Even when they are within sRGB gamut, the situation is the same, because the same (r,g,b) values in AdobeRGB and sRGB basically mean different colors - to the eye, or to a spectrophotometer.
At this point calibration and profiling of the monitor enters. Calibration being the proper setup of R,G and B guns , setting black and white points and color temperature. Profiling being setting up a LUT table to provide corrections between measured and expected colors on the screen. So - calibration and profiling are not the same thing, and are frequently mixed up. Let's assume at this point that our hardware is calibrated and profiled - in short, that it can reproduce sRGB space (or is close to it).
Now - assume that we work in AdobeRGB color space, in COLOR MANAGED application. The application still can't display full AdobeRGB gamut on the monitor - but it will make some intelligent (non-linear) mapping of colors into sRGB - because it KNOWS that the working color space is AdobeRGB. And these colors are displayed properly by our (calibrated and profiled) monitor. And all is good with the world.
Now - you post the file (AdobeRGB color space) on the net. The software which displays the file usually does not care about color space and assumes sRGB - which means that it treats the (r,g,b) numbers literally. No information is actually lost - just is interpreted in a simple way. You may end up with washed out colors and color shifts.
When, however, the file is CONVERTED from AdobeRGB to sRGB prior to uploading - the "intelligent" treatment of the AdobeRGB colors by the color aware application is preserved - because in the process of converting, the (r,g,b) numbers are actually changed - as compared to the original AdobeRGB file. At this point one only hopes that the monitor used for display, somewhere in the world, is actually calibrated and profiled. In which case someone will see an image pretty similiar to what you intended him to see.
In essence - work in AdobeRGB, and CONVERT to sRGB before uploading. Uploading AdobeRGB file is usually a recipe for misinterpretation. If sRGB file is uploaded - all the user needs is to have his monitor calibrated and (hopefully) profiled.
I hope that by posting this lengthy explanation I haven't added to the confusion
