I have just started chucking my 12" Cold Steel 'True Flight' throwing knife. Vastly easier than the crummy cheap little things I tried as a kid. From the handle, one full turn at three paces and it slams into the target point first. Great fun

I throw hawks and knives as well.  Other than rocks, they're probably my favorite things to throw.  I actually won a couple of competitions in a Frontiersmen organization with which I'm involved.  We go the whole nine yards with buckskin, muzzleloaders, hawks, knives, pelts, etc.  It's a lot of fun to leave modern amenities behind and just be in the wild outdoors like the days of long ago.

I usually throw my hawk at six paces, and my knife at five.  These distances allow for a full rotation of each respectively without the need to flick the wrist.  I prefer not to whip it and force the rotation, but rather release it.  The throws are still very powerful because you're using the strength of your entire arm and not just your wrist. 

I would be extremely careful throwing at three paces.  I once saw a guy (at a Frontiersmen camp) throw a knife from 5-6 paces, and the knife ricocheted off the wood target and cut his arm to pieces.  He had to get a lot of stitches, and if he hadn't put his hand up, it would have been his face...and that was from 5-6 paces.  Anyway, that was the only time I saw it happen like that, but it was enough to get me to make sure I stand back.

I've also had stones bounce back after I hit my target.  Several times I've hit one of my targets during my demonstration at the Passion Play and the rock hit the tree perfectly and came back almost to me.  This particular target is 30-35 feet away from me, and one time I hit it so perfectly that I was almost able to catch the stone.  It hit just a couple of feet short of my hand!

I read an article by Warren "Hawk" Boughton (I think) in one of the "Buckskinning" series a long time ago about how to throw a tomahawk and a knife. According to him, they should measure the distance from your elbow to the knuckle at the base of your middle finger, and weigh 1 ounce for every inch. I've tried his method, and it worked like a charm.

As a matter of fact, I bought my first 'hawk when I lived in Indiana. Walked outside the stoor, paced off the distance to the target stump (about 30 feet), and threw like he said to. Stuck dead center the first time, and I was hooked. I'm now working on a throwing knife to match my 'hawk.

I've learned there's no point to making a fancy throwing knife. It's going to get banged up a lot. And ALWAYS buy extra 'hawk handles!

I now go to the Portneuf Rendevous every year and throw tomahawks, knives, and atlatls.

I've always wanted to find one of those frontiersman gatherings. they always seemed like they'd be a lot of fun. i kinda gave up on wanting to throw knives myself though. never really was very good at it. but that's where slinging comes in. 

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Absolute Rule is this: It depends.

Hold the lighter end of the knife. If it's heavier in the blade, hold the handle. If it's heavier in the handle, hold the blade. Most of your larger throwing knives will be heavier in the blade.

Hope that helps.

With a blade-thrown knife, it's possible to adjust the grip on the knife to accommodate distance.     (to a degree)

Let's say you're standing 12 feet from the target, and gripping the knife about halfway down the blade.  It isn't "quite" sticking, it's not rotating quite enough.  If you shift your grip about 1/4" down (towards the tip), it will turn over a little quicker. 
Likewise, if it's over-rotating, you can slide your grip "up" towards the handle and slow it down a bit.

These adjustments are quite small; I too had one of those original "pro-throw" knives that the CS product is based on (back in the 70s!).  As I recall, about 1/4" of movement on the blade equated to about 1 foot of distance from the target.

Naturally, there's a point of vanishing returns.  You get to the point where there's no more blade...
Then, you go back down to the tip and start over, this time with your knife doing two turns instead of one.

Back when I was younger, I was able to make some successful throws at about 50 feet this way, painfully figuring out how the knife was hitting (hard to see at that distance!)
However, knives thrown at long distance have really bad aerodynamics, and tend to "windplane" rather badly.  That is, they start rotating in the other direction.
Maybe one of those CS "Torpedo" things would be more stable, if you were strong enough to throw one so far.

I believe I have a video that will answer your question. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZ190cRi0vU&feature=related

I have been throwing knives since I was a kid, probably started almost 40 years ago, and is still lousy at it, so here goes;  Throwing knives can be done for fun, sport, self defence and assassination, I suppose.  For fun whatewer is fun is right.  I like both ways myself, but have got a liking for the no-spin these last years.
 For sport whatever is appropriate is right .  
For self defense (let`s for simplicity say you are in a situation where throwing the knife is the right choice ) you either are in a situation where the enemy is already close, then a no-spin throw would be fine.  
Or he is at some distance, and you can manouvre yourself relative to him so you got him in a distance suitable for 1/2, 1, 1 1/2, 2, 2 1/2 or whatever spin, then a spin throw is fine.  
Guess nobody here  is assassins but I guess sneaking into, and throwing from, an multi-spin distance would do just fine.
timann