It's not "effectively" an ad for anything, it's a discussion forum. The fact that it also offers some publicity to YC's business is an additional aspect, but not the main one.

How about -

Banning all color in ads, all images/videos in ads, all ads in public (busses, billboards, etc), music in ads. Simply black and white text information (which is what YC adheres to).

Any step in that direction I support.

> Such a weak minded assertion as "ban all advertising" without considering how that impacts freedom of speech is unbelievable.

There are many categories of products that are already not allowed to advertised, where meta-discussion about the products still works fine.

Good point. So where do we draw the line between good advertising (i.e. new products, new movie trailers) and bad advertising (i.e. “beauty” product manipulations, sugary drink commercials)?