Reasonably close observation (lurking) for a while seems to show a trend. The HZ appears, to me, to be losing critical mass. There doesn't seem to be the variety of posters, of opinions and the cross-fertilization of newer people there used to be. And long-time stalwarts such as Raoul seem to post less and less. HZ may be turning into a chat room for the same 4 or 5 people, which might be the purpose. If so, please ignore this.

On the surface, the registration idea appears to be a good one which has caused or will shortly cause more problems than it solves. A semi-opaque "community", one in which they are shut out of most areas, may not be very attractive to newcomers. From here it looks like an experiment which needed to be tried and yielded good results - registration doesn't work in this case.

The "flash" interface is much more attractive to me than this. Make it bigger, add some color and I believe you'd have something good.

The "all things to all people" Wiki approach also makes sense if one is desiring to create another Second Life, Facebook or MySpace. It doesn't seem to have caught on, yet, and may be a distraction to the former function of HZ.

That there are 5 tiers of membership doesn't seem to be a problem. (Outsider, registered user, editor, moderator and administrator.) I'm also noting that activity in the back rooms may have rendered these obervations moot and personal animosities rendered them unwelcome.

With the best of reasons and motives HZ appears to me to have strayed a bit from what it did best - provide an easy, attractive, open place for the exchange of thoughts and ideas. The "work-in-progress" rationale doesn't seem to fit any more, it seems fairly static. With the exception of the "flash" interface. I would regard what seems to me to be the continued devolution, if indeed that is happening, of HZ with a good deal of sadness.

Something like gothgirl's observations, I'm just throwing these out for those of you who are more involved. They are meant to be constructive. I'm not going to argue any of these points - they are not facts, they may not reflect a grander reality or anyone else's reality. It's just how it seems from a step back from the Boards.

Arf