One of the major flaws with FF programs is to award miles based upon miles segments/miles flown regardless of routing. It would make more sense to only award miles the way the bird flies. If you fly from DFW to NRT, you should only get the miles as if this was flown as a non-stop. The current systems allow you to do odd routings such as DFW - LAX - ORD - NRT, for roughly the same price as the non-stop flight. The airline is loosing revenue by transporting passengers on extra flight segments. If everyone took the most direct routing, there would be many more seats open to sell to other passengers.