I have to confess at being surprised by the universal moral outrage I'm reading (I didn't read the original post but can guess at the nature).

I believe the major disconnect that may be happening here has to do with the nature of what we're participating in -- this is a business relationship. We're not getting FF miles for being nice guys or for having upstanding moral courage, we get them by fulfilling the completely arbitrary rules of the game.

I don't think the correct moral/ethical question here is one of "do unto others" because FF Programs/airlines are not people -- they have only fiduciary and legal responsibilities, there is no moral or ethical requirement for incorporation that i know of.

Obviously since people are tossing around words like "fraud" this proposal was on shaky ground beyond the ethical considerations.

But if you really want to discount the idea on ethical or moral grounds, I think you first have to explain why we have a responsibility to the program in the first place to do anything beyond fulfilling the letter of the rules of the FF program?

Why do we have so many threads about loopholes and tricks in the first place? Ethically, the only "correct" way to get the miles would be to fly them, but we have never seen a clear consensus on how many boxes of kellog's cereal are ethical and how many are immoral.

Someone who flies 49,950 miles and is refused Gold status is keenly aware that the airline has no interest in the "spirit" of the programs -- ultimately their only obligation is to the letter of the contract.

They may do you a "favor" by giving you Gold status regardless, but this is only a favor. You have clearly lived up to the "spirit" of the FF program by flying the large number of miles, you have only failed to achieve the letter of the contract, and we see nothing immoral about their actions.

So the more significant question is whether we have any ethical or moral obligation to the FF programs at all? Or is it simply a matter of enlightened self-interest that we should avoid tampering with the value of the programs? Because that doesn't seem like a particularly high moral ground from which to throw stones.

(edited to clarify :P)

[This message has been edited by artboy (edited 12-22-2001).]