I agree 100%. This is the one program that I respect and accumulate points in whenever possible. I use the SPG Amex and only convert the points into miles to top off an account at the time of use. "Borderline fraud" is a good way to describe the capacity controls. I think that they should be forthright with the way the controls work and tell the public the minimum number of award seats for a given plane (it can depend on the plane size or whatever) and tell how many that are taken. I think that some flights actually have no seats available at all and they are later released if the airline "feels like it."

I have NEVER been turned down for a room in a Starwood hotel. With flights, I rarely get the first choice date and often get nothing. Though, strangely enough, I actually just redeemed some "Nonepass" miles and got the first choice dates. Of course, I am booking 7 months out.....

I think that the explanation for the whole thing is that the programs have to have some "controlling factor". For Starwood, it is in the earning. Save for a small bonus here and there, there are not easy ways to gain large amounts of points quickly as there are for airline miles. For all of the others, they give tons of bonuses and the controlling factor is the redemption. I just spent $150 for a flight to Florida and got about 10k miles for a 1,000 mile flight after the triple miles, online booking bonus, and some other bonuses were done. If you spent $150 at a SPG hotel, you would get 300 points, maybe if you were lucky, a 500 point bonus or something, but nowhere near the bonuses that the airlines are dealing out.