I'm gonna get the open air filter (10 bucks @autozone) because it's almost as cheap as a paper replacement and i know of people who have documented that they got slightly better gas mileage.
Otherwise i would never buy one because of the "riceboy" image attached to them.
I'm not really sure what you mean by
if you're talking about complete gimmicks like the Tornado or Z-Max then yeah i agree, but not with things like Intake manifolds, Heads, Headers etc. Those mods do give gains in HP and torque. But that's just me rambling
-Mitch-