Well, things like this did ultimately have an effect on airline frequent-flyer programs, primarily in that every program which offers status-based perks for reaching mileage totals now only considers mileage that comes from actually putting your butt on a plane (unofficially referred to as "BIS" -- for "butt-in-seat" miles, officially referred to as various terms depending on program, such as "elite-qualifying miles" with American Airlines).
And of course that also can be gamed through mileage runs, where you simply spend some time searching for cheap long-distance fares on the airline or one of its alliance partners, and use that to rack up extra qualifying miles. Which in turn has led to countermeasures from the airlines: ultra-discounted fares on partner airlines often earn only a tiny fraction of mileage flown, and two of the three US-based legacy carriers (Delta and United) now also have a minimum dollars-spent requirement in addition to the mileage-flown requirement.
Largely this is because the miles themselves, as an alternate way to purchase airline tickets, are not much of a hit, but the status perks are. Airlines do some interesting balancing acts in terms of wanting to attract people who fly a lot (and thus spend money on tickets) vs. not wanting to be so top-heavy with people entitled to free perks that you end up losing money on them.
As a rare exception, Delta will in fact let you earn bona-fide Medallion Qualifying Miles by using their fanciest credit card (no, not the Gold card, the $400/yr Delta Reserve card that also gets you into the lounges and counts as half-a-status-level for first-class upgrades)
The old US Airways card from Barclays did it too, but the reissue as AA-branded moved that perk to only the upper tier of the card, and drastically raised the spend requirement.
Used to be, $25k spend would convert 10k miles to US PQM. Now, $20k spend converts 5k miles to AA EQM, and you can do it twice a year (so max 10k conversion from $40k spend).
* Free (capacity-based) upgrades to first class on domestic flights
* Buying a full-fare economy-class (rather than discounted) ticket auto-upgrades you to first class at time of purchase
* Free checked bags
* Free access to exit rows and other extra-legroom seats
* Discount on lounge membership, and free access to lounges when you're departing internationally
* Priority customer-service access
* Waiving of lots of fees (for things like last-minute flight changes)
Moving up through the status levels, the perks have a tendency to get pretty nice; I've done multiple flights to/from Europe where I paid for an economy-class ticket and upgraded into business class for free, for example. I've also had access, regardless of fare class, to the fancy international lounges (most recently, had a shower and a hot breakfast after an overnight flight into London a couple weeks ago).
Perks are things like free first class upgrades, lounge access, no fees for checked luggage, no fee for flying standby on an earlier flight, free liquor, etc. They don't sound like much, but if you travel a lot, they are really useful.
Also slightly related: nobody pays for first class on domestic flights. Everyone up in first class is normally a frequent flyer (they tell you when you check in if you got an upgrade).
I've paid for domestic first a few times on routes where I knew the upgrade would be rough otherwise, or when I needed the bonus fare-based points to hit a status goal.
Also, on the big three carriers (America, Delta and United), upgrades get processed multiple days out depending on your level of status. Currently as Executive Platinum on AA, I can be upgraded as early as four days out from the flight. I'm actually waiting for the email right now to see if my upgrades will clear for a couple segments later this week.
United used to be my favourite airline for flying London to San Francisco, because while their economy seating were so-so, their perks as you racked up the miles were vastly better than e.g. British Airways or Virgin (far more frequent upgrades, for example, and a year of free premium economy upgrade after just a couple of roundtrips). Given that the price per seat was not very different, it was crazy how big the difference in perks was, and totally unsurprising that they've tightened up....
The Southwest "Premier" card provides 1,500 points toward status, and the lowest status level on Southwest requires 35,000 points.
The former US Airways "Premier World" card would convert 10,000 of the (non-qualifying) miles it earned into qualifying miles, once per year, when you hit a total of $25,000 spent on the card in the year. The lowest status tier required 25,000 qualifying miles.
The current American Airlines "Aviator Silver" card, which is what the US Airways card rebranded as in the merger, will convert 5,000 miles to qualifying miles when you hit $20,000 spent, and another 5,000 miles when you hit $40,000. The lowest status tier requires 25,000 qualifying miles.
The Delta "Reserve" card will convert 15,000 miles to qualifying at $30,000 spent, and another 15,000 miles at $60,000 spent. The lowest status tier requires 25,000 qualifying miles.
The only other non-flying method of earning qualifying miles that I've seen in this decade was an occasional promotion US Airways would run, offering 5,000 qualifying miles for buying or renewing a lounge membership. It was not offered last year, and probably will not be offered this year.
Note that airlines will occasionally allow you to buy your way up to the next status tier if you're within a certain range, but that typically doesn't actually deposit miles into your account: you just pay the fee, get the higher status, and that's that. Last year, American Airlines offered a flat-rate buy-up if you were within 15,000 miles or 15 segments of the next tier, for example, so at 85,000 qualifying miles you could have paid a couple thousand dollars to buy up to Executive Platinum status.
Southwest's website didn't mention it was repeatable, just said 1,500 points. So that's what I went with (I don't know Southwest's program all that well, and it's debatable whether it should really be considered "status" in the same league as the AA/Delta/United programs).
They don't typically. (Source: I have branded cards.) I'm told there are (a very few) exceptions but qualifying miles for status are almost exclusively "butt in seat" miles.
And of course that also can be gamed through mileage runs, where you simply spend some time searching for cheap long-distance fares on the airline or one of its alliance partners, and use that to rack up extra qualifying miles. Which in turn has led to countermeasures from the airlines: ultra-discounted fares on partner airlines often earn only a tiny fraction of mileage flown, and two of the three US-based legacy carriers (Delta and United) now also have a minimum dollars-spent requirement in addition to the mileage-flown requirement.
Largely this is because the miles themselves, as an alternate way to purchase airline tickets, are not much of a hit, but the status perks are. Airlines do some interesting balancing acts in terms of wanting to attract people who fly a lot (and thus spend money on tickets) vs. not wanting to be so top-heavy with people entitled to free perks that you end up losing money on them.