To Will:
Test it. I'm not going to say you're right or wrong, but I would suggest testing and I trust you'd do it honestly. I won't argue with any facts you come up with, one way or another.
But here you spend countless hours going on and on and on rehashing the same argument. And yes, many of your points are valid. But you seem to always assume that YOU know what is best. You are arguing with someone (Smokey) who clearly has tested the site and further, you make many assumptions about AWE's traffic and webmasters clearly without trying yourself.
(In re: How you seem to know better than everyone: Your point in another thread about anyone who experiences slow days (e.g. holidays) or seasonal dropoffs is just make excuses is so completely absurd it's hard to know where to start. Because YOU never experienced it then it's *impossible* days/seasons can be slow for anyone else, no matter what niche, market, etc.? Come on...)
For everyone else:
Yes, AWE does things much different. Different must be bad. Different is uncomfortable for many of you. It's understandably difficult when you are still doing the same things with the same people the last 5-10 years. Change is not easy. That's why you still use ICQ
But numbers don't lie. Over the past few years it's clear they have greatly increased the number of webmasters who promote them. Are they all stupid? Are they all not making any money? And/or are they all taking advantage of the cookie system and sending garbage traffic?
Regardless of the rather ignorant opinion that it doesn't reward good webmasters vs. ones that send junk traffic, they are doing very well. Their webmasters are doing very well. Those that aren't probably have left. Those that think it's unfair, probably have left too. So what else is worth arguing about, really?