This indeed might be the case. When will KE give details on the new program?

I will stick to KE if there's a lifetime program. If there's no lifetime program, I'm leaving for another program.

No more lifetime status. I've already ditched KE. :p

I'm betting KAL will be keeping lifetime status in place.

That said, I will remain loyal to Delta over UA/OZ. Mostly

Maybe KE will have lifetime Elite for less than 500k? Who knows.

Morning Calm Premium and Million Miler members, whose status is permanent, will keep their lifetime membership as gold and platinum level members, respectively. The current benefits of Morning Calm Premium and Million Miler members will be available until January 31, 2022, which is right before the launch of the new Elite membership system. New benefits can be enjoyed from February 1, 2022.
The new program will be introduced and implemented as of April 1, 2020. However, after a grace period, the changes in elite program will be enforced as of February 1, 2022.

New Skypass ? Korean Air

Nope. KE made it pretty clear in their "Fact Check". There won't be any new lifetime anything once the programme changes in 2022. Morning Calm Premium and Million Miler will get lifetime Gold and Platinum respectively with the new programme. I probably wouldn't have ditched KE so hard if they kept some sort of lifetime status. Oh well...

Why won't they get Platinum & Diamond respectively? Morning Calm Premium and Million Miler were the top levels before, now these members are being downgraded? This does not seem fair, I hope the Korean lawsuits win.

KE said they will consider making more changes to the new Skypass program due to numerous complaints.
So the lifetime status might continue on for those who havent earned it yet.

No actually they never said there wouldn't be lifetime status in the new program. That was never explicit in the "FAQ".

I wouldn't try to kill people's hopes over an assumption.

It's not in the English FAQ section. It's in the "new" Fact Check section KE made on their Korean site/app.

It says in Korean "평생 회원이 없어지고 매년 실적 달성을 해야하니 우수회원이 되기 더 어려워졌다? No"

Which roughly translates to "It's harder to achieve elite status as it has to be renewed every year and lifetime membership gets eliminated? No"

And then they give examples of how much easier it would be to reach an elite status with the new programme... I hate the way they've worded this and lifetime status question should have been asked separately, but it was probably put together deliberately to minimise the backlash of eliminating the lifetime status.

Well, maybe you can come to a different conclusion after reading about it here.
https://micro.koreanair.com/mainevent/202001/mileage/

Thanks for providing that link. It looks like the elimination of life time benefits is implied by the "flyer's question to KAL". They do try to make the argument that the new program is more rewarding.

The new program is definitely more rewarding. Just not for the passenger.

By any chance do you think they'll change the RTW redemption? I have a 147k and was working my way towards business at 220k. But won't be able to do that by April 2021. Should i just go ahead and do RTW now?

I actually teach some high profile corporate attorneys and one of the guys is following this. He said that there is actually a case with the Korean FTC? or some other govt agency that this is "unfair" and they might not actually implement the changes. It's crazy to think that could happen, but the law here is very PRO consumer. However, in my case with my miles - they told me use them now to be absolutely safe. Especially if you can use them fully and not have many remaining.

I read the email in regards to the change and I am not clear.
I have enough miles for a business flight to ICN.
Do I have to book before 4/1/2020 to lock in the price. Or by March 2021 since there is 1 year of transition?
Will the new cash and points be available post 4/1/2020 along with the old award chart?