I earn elite through miles. I fly both paid J and Y internationally and redeem my miles almost exclusively for international J rewards. Three years ago, I kept almost all my paid and reward international travel on CO metal. I thought BF was the be all-end all and I had no problem flying from DCA to EWR to catch a CO international flight. At that time, many of the international carriers had not yet updated their J products.

Today, AF and KL have updated their J products and both have AVOD, comparable (some would say better, some would say worse) food, better wines, and AF has a better seat (the new KL seat is uncomfortable for sleeping, IMO). And, we can earn and burn miles on VS. So, if I have to go to LON, for example, in paid J, why should I fly up to EWR to fly BF when I can go nonstop from IAD on VS with the best J seat in the industry, unless I'm on a Z fare or whatnot? Same goes for AMS and CDG - why not fly nonstop from IAD on AF or KL? After having flown BF and J on VS, AF, EK, and KL over the past two years, I now try to redeem on partners as well, and only choose CO if the schedule works better or if there is no availability on my desired partner flights.

I don't think BF is a bad product, I just try to look at my options and make an informed decision. Over the last couple of years, this has led me to choose partner metal more than CO metal. I still fly CO internationally - in fact, I have a trip to Europe coming up next week on CO metal (my second paid int'l trip of the year on CO metal). I don't know if I'm in the minority, but I'm only Gold and don't fly as much as many people, so my decisions may not have as much effect as those of people who fly paid J to Europe/Asia twice a month and begin booking away from CO. But, in the aggregate, people with my flying patterns would have a significant impact over the long term.