View from the Wing notes that Aegean is offering 2000 status miles for signing up for an account. Rather crucially, Aegean has an extremely low bar for Star Alliance Silver status (4k status miles), which offers a free checked bag on United and US Airways. For the time being, Aegean offers “lifetime” (for the lifetime of the program’s generosity) status. FlyerTalk has a crash course thread for additional information.
While US-based fliers are used to fares which earn at least 1 mile per mile flown, Aegean credits discount United coach fares (W, S, T, L, K) at 50% (or in the case of United’s recently added N fare, potentially 0%). All US Airways revenue fare classes (that I’m aware of) credit at 100%.
For the traveler without status (and any forgone elite redeemable mile bonuses), crediting a cheap US Airways transcontinental flight to Aegean can be a cheap way of obtaining free baggage allowances in the future. Based on the current US Airways share miles promotion, the opportunity cost of 2k miles is $22.70 (if the transaction fee is amortized over 50k miles).