The UA to Hilton 1:4 promotion was offered once - at that time Randy called it the "deal of the century".

While there are instances where transfers may be useful, I do not think that I would call an an airline program "dead-end" simply because it did not offer any conversion out. For the airline programs where I have a high balance, I would not transfer out because transfering out reduces value. The 1:4 special UA->HH offer is probably the only airline transfer where value was not reduced.