Etymology is a complex and often convoluted topic, particularly for a language learner who may not be able to understand etymological information in the target language. Do you think there's no value at all in simplified memory aids, such as James Heisig's approach?
Some people argue that the pronunciation part of most characters is seldom 100% accurate, but neither is English spelling, and at least it has some connection to the pronunciation. And like Chinese characters, to really understand spelling you need to know some things about the etymology.
I think the approach in the original link is great for learning Japanese, not Chinese. I use a handful of "story" mnemonics to disambiguate really similar Hanzi, though, when the "built in" mnemonics fail.
But if you want to be proficient, you have to be able to read words as a chunk with associated meaning and pronunciation, without the intermediate mnemonic device. So at best it's something you'd want to forget, and at worst it's something that you wouldn't want to learn in the first place.
There's lots of evidence to show that mnemonics boost recollection by a factor or three or so across a wide range of domains, abilities and time ranges. See e.g. http://www.unforgettablelanguages.com/studies.html
Re the intermediate mnemonic device, here's the way I picture things. The mnemonic provides training wheels for your brain, helping you get the answer right a few times. Then, after enough correct responses, mediated by this (hippocampal) mnemonic representation, you rely less and less on the training wheels, and your cortex has had a chance to form a longer-lasting and more direct semantic link.
Disclosure: I'm one of the co-founders of Memrise, so it's not too surprising that I think there's merit in this approach :) Drop me a line or reply here, and I can try and follow up in more detail. Maybe I should write a blog post...
Really? By who? Because sure as hell training wheels worked wonders for millions of kids worldwide...