petercek

I was flying First only once in my life (on LH) on miles. Booked seat 1A. When on board, crew privately asked me if there's any chance to switch my window seat with an upset F passenger seating aisle. He was disappointed not having a window seat. Of course I was kind and switch. The crew captain came to me mid-flight with 200 eur vouchers as a thank you...
First world's problems.
What I want to say is that in this case, the customer was the king. And LH took an F passenger with all respect and fulfilled its wish. I was also happy to get 200 EUR. However, if I had 10kEUR to pay for F, 200EUR was only pocket money. But the gesture was in favour of the other passenger and he surely was happy and did not think of booking the next F travel with AF or EK for example. If he was right or not, there's no correct answer. He wanted that and got it.
I don't know if EK does the same with F passengers or Platinum status members but to certain extent they (EK) should be careful. Their neighbours don't sleep. I, as a Y passenger, see EK superior of LH (which I usually fly with) for certain candies such as: emergency seat request fulfilled almost every time, best of best IFE, great seats and interior, smooth boarding and good schedule for my Asia travels. I'll hit Silver but has no benefits other than silver colour card. With LH, silver is a ticket to european lounges and also gave me a couple of op-ups. But it's difficult to reach it with my booking classes that usually gave 25% - 50% miles. Anyways, I'm good with EK so far and don't feel they're over rated in Y class.

If I was in position to fly even more frequently and high class (F, J), I'd certainly split business. Flying 3-4 times in F on LH gets you 2-year Senator for example. Being a premium member (on long term) in several alliances can give a good comparison which airline fights for its customers best.