I guess we all notice the plugging if we surf the forums / fora.
Hardly matters to most of us ...
But there are the more serious users to consider .... I thought the web concept was freedom and openess for all .. But very little comes for nothing today.
I as a relatively newby surfer, would tend not to add to a site's popularity in terms of active posters when it has the, free, but tiresome "Trade / Profession only" forums .. so the advertisers lose another possible customer, only a single drop in the ocean, but then droplets are what Oceans are built from !!
P