There's a bit of confusion around, even amongst Alaska Air reps, since, at the moment (up til 31 Dec) there are no change fees - including for award bookings - under a WAIVER. After 31 Dec, there will still be no change fees, but then it will be so under the new permanent policy. (So, yeah, the waiver ends, which makes it seem like fees will apply again, but for the new policy kicking in to eliminate them once again.)
I say this having made and changed several Milage Plan bookings, on QF, this year and spoken to Alaska reps about the policies etc.
Now, as for cancellation fees, I am not quite as confident. But I figure if you can change date and destination for no fee, you could just keep making changes until you eventually got a flight you could take.