In terms of the process of clearing upgrades, nothing has changed. Upgrades are only cleared once a flight is closed (within 30 mins for domestic and 60 mins for the others); very often if there are only a few seats left in J, the agent will wait to see if any misconnects which will result in additional J seats being freed up (and this is especially true at a station with lots of connections such as FRA and LHR) hence there is often a delay in announcing that J is full and please board with your original boarding pass. Most of you will probably agree that it's rare these days that the J cabin remains wide open and your R doesn't clear prior to departure day?