Having said that and re-read the article I couldn't be struck by the adverts (jobs & fogbugz) then the left hand sidebar and lots of black text and hard edged images (images of rego screens), squashed text (lots of spaces on LH & RH side).
Maybe nickb is right. The page design also sucks making it hard to read and possibly needs some attention?
>pg's articles and talks are for publicising yc.
I don't think so. PG was writing essays and giving talks about startups before YC.
HackerNews is an ad for yc, pg's articles and talks are for publicising yc. I think the real difference b/w blatant advertising and the type Joel and pg (Buchheit, Greenspun, Yegge, maybe 37Sigs) is they impart knowledge, useful knowledge. If they did not entertain, inform and question readers wouldn't bother reading their pieces.
But I do understand the continuous 'Fogbugz' references. Maybe it's the geek in you rejecting someone telling you need something when you don't.