Shareholder, you always appear to be the AC apologist and on this topic you're missing the main point - consumer (and employee) confusion is created by all of these stupid rules which have no rational explanation. If my flight at 5 pm is delayed until 5:30 pm and the 4 pm is leaving in the next few minutes, why should I not be able to get an empty seat on that one, especially if I am not checking luggage? As someone else asked, why would this rule only apply to certain domestic routes?