Hi, Callahan. At first i would like to say a huge THANKS for your Insane article. No, really, job is great, I simply felt that I must write a reply. Same thing sometimes happens to me -I often write long forum posts with detailed answer for the simplest questions and nothing can stop me).
What I want to ask about is increasing rep with Steamwheedle Cartel. There also another way to gain reputation - grinding South-sea pirates, which live in Tanaris, on the eastern coast next to CoT enterance. I doubt what is more productive: farming DM or grinding 44-46 lvl mobs. Make a look:
Adressing your guide, due to approx. 1/2 of DM runs will be without key drop, so player has to farm "80-100 hours for Steamwheedle". At the same time I go to Tanaris with my 80 Nelf Feral Druid and start grinding mobs(one-hit kill on my lvl). Mob kill gives +5 rep with gadgetzan and +3 with others from Cartel. Test run showed that per hour I gain more than 3k rep with gadgetzan and more than 1,8k rep with others. After calculations we have 20 hours to hit exalted with gadgetzan and 14 more to exalted with others. Isn't it better than those 80 hours? Another plus is you needn't use brain while grinding, unlike during DM run. Just repeat skill rotation, mobs easily one-shoted. Finally, after getting neutral some quests unlocked which don't decrease rep with Blooodsail. To be honest I'm not sure if mobs grant rep after honored lvl, but i think so. The only thing I need is your advice: maybe there are smth wrong in my theory? If not, I will be glad if this helped.
Good luck and thx again. And sorry for English if any)