I don't really have a problem with the check in, Jetblue does the same thing, 24hrs-3hrs before your show time you call crew voice press #2, enter employee number, pin, and #1, then done, took less than a minute.
I know you guys are thinking this all all evil and bad, its just to let the company know you are aware that you have a trip coming up, at the 3hr mark for us if we don't get checked in they call us if we don't respond they call out a reserve with a 2hr call out, flight still goes out on time.
Now that's what a good company does with it, what will mesa do with it:
They will use it to notify you that you have been reassigned to some different trip (this is now legal with your new contract, but your pay protected for all your flying so you may fly less and get paid more, great, you may fly the more and get paid the more [pay protected for the more now] if it goes past your original footprint you get 200% pay, cool stick it to JO!)
Crew Tracking is so far behind that there is no way they will JA you 24hrs out, let alone 4 days out on 4 day trip. It does not matter whether you check in or not, they are going to reassign you anyways its just gonna take more time, but the fact is your not gonna fly a flight that does not have your name on the release, so you might as well be notified of your trip as far in advanced as possible
One more thing to add to the list: FULL PAY FOR DHD!!!