last year (97) UA informed in May/June about changes in their frequent flyer program per 1-1-98. I haven't seen any announcements yet per january first 99 (except that they give up 2-people-awards as per end of march 99 - and that means that the "recompensation" in 98 for the "killed" plateau bonus, the 10'000/20'000/40'000 rebate on 2-people-awards also dissappear).

I also guess that StarAlliance wants to unify more or less the different programs in the not so far future.

Without knowing yet what is ahead, I prefer to wait with my judgement till end of dec.

In the meantime (not really having a general overall-view) I guess that, at least comparing StarAlliance-members, Lufthansa is the most attractive/fastest accumulating program: they give 100% bonus for paid business and 200% bonus for paid first and those bonus also count as Status. (Example: with one round the world-ticket with 38'000 basic-miles in FIRST-class you are already Senator which compares to UA's 1K). But for my overseas-correspondents here on FlyerTalk - that program probably doesn't fit their/your individual needs.