You're right, Dr. HFH. And I'm usually good at seeing asterisks and reading fine print. Nonetheless in this case I literally didn't see it.
I suppose my expectations were tempered by what is routine for me as an AA elite, where companion benefits extend to others in the reservation, so I thought Alaska would be the same -- and I wasn't looking for any provision to the contrary. I also wouldn't have thought that the asterisk could literally contradict what came right before; it is a standard principle of consumer law fine print can clarify ambiguities in large print but cannot contradict or take back what the large print promises.
I wrote to Alaska customer service -- this, still before I learned (from this thread) that Alaska didn't intend to provide companion benefits to Oneworld elite pax. Here is what Alaska's customer service sent me in an email reply:
I regret hearing that our website and Kiosks were not providing the baggage waivers to your companions as oneworld elite members. We are showing the baggage fee waiver should have been provided. I have shared these concerns with our development team for an internal review.
I don't know what to make of it. Most charitably, they're confused the same way I was. But if Alaska's baggage policy is so confusing that it 1) confuses me, who has litigated about baggage fees against AA for multiple years and achieved a seven-digit recovery in a class action on that subject, and also 2) confuses Alaska's own customer service reps -- then something needs to improve.