The original purpose of groups was to allow you to organize lan parties to play Halo: CE. Then it was going to be for a web presence for your Halo 2 clans before clan functionality got scaled waaaay back. Then, they just became places to hide from the moderators, for good or bad (i.e., your own little walled garden). That last purpose serves little value to the community - we want to you to create more open, inclusive groups. That's why everything tries to push you in this direction in the system. Lower membership limit, bans applying to groups too, defaulting your group to public upon creation, etc. We definately intend to give groups real purpose, though, these are only the first steps toward a goal you can't see yet. But don't expect that purpose to include the "hiding in your own walled garden." You'll still be able to lock your group down if you want, but that won't really be the best way to use groups in the future. The Internet is a big place, you can do that elsewhere.