The idea of an avatar is to provide a unique image to make your account recognisable.
I don't understand the benefit to the forum or the member from having a link to BitcoinTalk in a signature. It just clutters up the thread, and provides no advantages in my opinion.
You can see the benefits or not, it depends on your perspective.
I integrated links to Epochtalk's Github as well as two trial forums with Epochtalk software, one from unknown person, and one from Coinbistro. There is also a link to Satoshi's lesson. So the signature is helpful or not, it depends on who see it and how they feel about it.
Satoshi's lesson, which is a very inspirational thread (written by theymos) I have ever seen in the past two years (in my perspective), and I believe not all users know about it.