I too have a hard time lasting it out through an essay that seems very self-promotional. Many essayists whose work I used to look forward to reading (J. Spolsky, P. Graham, etc) seem to have become stuck in a rut of beating a particular set of drums. These drums seem to promote in some way, the business interests of the person writing.

To me this diminishes their credibility and puts me off their writing.

Strangely when I see Lessig doing this for his various causes it does not inspire the same reaction in me. Possibly this is because I don't think that Lessig is deliberately writing in a way that can lead directly to personal monetary profit, although he certainly could profit from his growing cachet due to his political activity.

Possibly I am just being cynical.

Haha, I love how every time someone (usually someone who works for fogcreek no doubt!) posts a story about Fog Creek on HN-- because they always get exposed for their irrelevance. Fog Creek is as relevant to HN as a ".NET Solutions Partner" from Muskogee.

Erm, Joel didn't write this; someone else on the FogBugz team did.

If advertising is entertaining and interesting then more power to the promoter.