Originally Posted by nwflyboy

The good old days are ending.

I'm convinced we are in the twilight of this game. There are simply too many people playing, too many people making it too obvious, too many greedy people pushing the limits, too many bloggers, and too many idiots who don't understand that none of this is sustainable when it's all so visible.

The game used to be quietly, discreetly played, and it went on more or less at the same level for years (decades, actually). Things have changed. In the past year or so, this has gotten so much attention that it's simply not sustainable (if you want to identify the day it crossed the rubicon, the day that FT started a dedicated MS forum is as good a marker as any - after that, the end was inevitable). Hundreds of bums started blogs, selling themselves as "travel experts", pimping credit cards, and making a lot of money off clueless noobs. The number of points in circulation exploded. Unwashed low-life's who previously rarely or never traveled at all suddenly started filling up the premium cabins, much to the chagrin of the airlines' actual elite customers, and the airlines became uncomfortable looking like they were being played for suckers. So they all massively devalued their programs, repeatedly. The companies that we're being exploited to generate points didn't like looking like suckers either, so they started closing loopholes. One after another, so many of the easy options have been closed. Today it's amazon payments. Next it may be walmart or any of the other remaining options, but you can count on them all closing down at some point, probably sooner rather than later. Sure, the bloggers will tell you that this is just how is has always been, and all the recent exploit closures will be replaced by other, equally easy options. But like most self-serving things the bloggers tell you, that's not true.

The gravy train is over, kids. You are going to have to go back to flying coach. You are going to have to pay for tickets. And so-called "travel bloggers" are going to have to go out and find a real job - terrifying prospects, I know.

Who could ever have imagined that this wasn't going to go on forever, with everyone easily flying first class all over the world and staying in five star resorts in exotic locations, all for free or nearly so? What a shock to discover that the companies providing such perks intended them to go to well-heeled paying customers, not the vanilla reload crowd?