I travel AA and all seats that are aisle or window are now preferred seats and you have to pay a fee to sit in them.
That's not true.
American Airlines still offers window and aisle seats as regular economy seats.
For example, on an American MD80, there are 13 window seats, 5 aisle seats, and 18 middle seats that are not Preferred or Preferred Plus. Many of those seats allow 2 or even 3 seats to be assigned together without any fee. (There are 4 rows of 3 non-preferred seats in the back of the plane.)
Of course, those are likely to be the first seats grabbed by people who book far ahead.
In addition, there are 17 seats that are not available for pre-assignment, not even for top-tier frequent flyers in the AAdvantage program. These are under airport control and are perfect for family members who want to travel together and are willing to get to the airport early.
Also, there are 15 seats that are available only to elite-level AAdvantage members. Other passengers won't see them as available on the seat map. (They will appear to be already assigned.) On routes that primarily serve leisure travelers, some of them may go unassigned until 24 hours before the flight, when American will assign regular passengers to them.
I'm not defending AA. The majority of seats on the plane now require an extra fee for pre-assignment. The old system was definitely more friendly for families who want to travel together. But, under today's a la carte airline pricing, optional seat assignment fees are one of the factors to consider when comparing prices on different airlines.
One other thing to be aware of is that not everyone has to pay a fee for Preferred seats on American. Full-fare economy passengers and the airline's best customers (very frequent flyers) can get them without an additional fee. Of course, a full-fare economy ticket can cost 5 times as much as a discounted economy ticket, and very frequent flyers might be spending tens of thousand of dollars with American every year.