Did you make this non-sequitur reply because you didn't read my post, or because you read it, disagree, but don't choose to explain why?
I know the original intent was to completely hide the HUD. My point is that this is not necessarily a good idea.
Oh, i'm sorry, i've answered your first question.
* Imo it's not needed to have controlls here - you can always use the keyboard shortcuts (e.g. the radar level changes if you select an actor which is on a different level, or when you use the cursor up/down keys to switch levels)
* zooming is no option, too, because the radar is build out of screenshots, not 3d data, so it would look ugly at some point
* info about health and so on will be added to the radar - no need to show the hud here
the problem with showing the hud here, is, that the hud is a script file. it can easily be changed to look completely different. that's why i would still vote for showing a static background.
@BTAxis - that all depends on the size of the screenshot. The rest is autoscaling.