I'm not sure exactly what Paul is talking about, but I can speak from my own personal experience. Anecdotes can be deceptive I know, so take this with a grain of salt but it's just my own experience.

I have flown a good amount of CX long-haul F since moving to Asia ~9 years ago. Until last year, I have flown that four ways:
*Op-ups (duh)
*Asia Miles redemption awards on cash J tickets
*Asia miles straight redemptions
*Cash F tickets, on both A fares (discounted cash F) and F fares (full fare cash F)

I thought I was reasonably familiar with how people got into the F cabin...until I woke up to the reality of FT (I was quite an active user, but quite an idiot when it came to frequent flier programs...guilty). And that's when I realized that you could effectively "buy" F with Alaska miles for about $1300-$1700 one-way, or - even more hilarious - score F for free by just signing up for a bunch of US credit cards and either transferring into to Alaska, or getting a bunch of American miles and doing it that way.

I thought, certainly what I describe in my last paragraph isn't possible. Certainly I haven't spent hundreds of thousands of USD on CX tickets in the past when in fact, with a little bit of knowledge, I could've actually spend a fraction of that. So I signed up for a bunch of US credit cards which took precisely zero work, got nearly 300k miles for doing pretty much nothing, and then bought a bunch of Alaska miles. And to my amazement, it worked!

I had observed the debates here from afar, about how award programs and all these mileage are actually "payment" and whatnot and hadn't really thought about it. But once I tried it, I realized how screwy the whole system really is. The reason I feel comfortable saying the system is screwy is CX is losing a significant chunk of my revenue now. Revenue that would've gone to last minute J and F cash tickets (the most expensive types!), ironically these very tickets have become my least expensive tickets!

I cannot imagine the airline is expecting their absolute, rock-bottom cheapest "filler" F (and J) tickets to be cannibalizing their most expensive. Something is badly askew with revenue management when that's occurring. This isn't rocket science. The blame lies squarely CX.

Anyway, I will say that I really feel stupid because for over half my time in Asia I've paid my own way. This isn't some corporate's money...it's mine. And I feel like a moron. I don't think a company should put their cash paying customers in a position to feel like they were absolute idiots just for not knowing a trick to paying literally 1/10 to 1/15 the price. You may think I'm a little off the mark, but just sharing my personal feelings. I really like looking at the pictures at the One Mile Time blog and the others but I can't help but feel a tinge of pain because there is no free lunch....it was my wallet and others' who don't know any better who are basically subsidizing that frequent flier mileage party. It just doesn't feel right to me. And everyone I've mentioned this to, all of whom also pay for their tickets, are pretty jawstruck at the realization.

Of course, the airlines are the fools for setting this all up like it. And now they depend on those mileage tickets because there are too many premium seats, particularly F. I'll also add that J seats are just so superb these days that has heavily cannibalized the need for F. But that's another topic. Just sharing my sentiments. I've joined the mileage party now for the record. I still buy a lot of cash tickets, but when possible I do burn American, Alaska and credit card points....I just have a little bit of regret for not doing so earlier, and feeling like I was the idiot paying for someone else's ticket. At least in my case, I don't feel good about effectively subsidizing others' tickets just because I didn't know better. I understand price discrimination but I didn't think such a crazy difference would be possible.