In my view FWIW the ecosystem that Bitcoin exists in is so heavily interlinked with Altcoins - that references to them are  natural and even inevitable, so discussions which stray onto Altcoins are fine in my view- obviously to an extent, I think its just the excessive hardcore shilling, spamming, trolling aimed at promoting altcoins, ICO's POnzi's P&D's etc which are less fine and more likely to get on peoples nerves? or simply be better placed in another thread? That being said this thread has turned into a general hang out, so you know- as long as it doesn't turn into the Shitcoin thread - don't think its toooo much of a problem? as has been mentioned also- it generally goes down like a sack of Ether in a flash crash around here, so it doesn't really get much traction when it is an overt sales pitch.