i've always hated HMs, since most of them aren't useful or necessary in the field after a couple of occasions, but all, up until white at least, are necessary at least once, and the pokemans who can learn loads of them are usually bland ones, like bibarel in diamond...
i'm fond of what they did in black and white though, reducing them to 6 - and i've gotten all my gym badges and am training for the elite 4 now, and i've only been given 4 of them so far, and only needed 3 to progress the game as well! and what's more, you can load them all onto just 2 pokemans, if you pick the right ones...
oshawott and dewott learn 4 and the final evolution samurott can learn 5 of the 6, which is awesome, and ducklett and its evolution swanna can learn 3, including the only one samurott can't learn, fly, and both samurott and swanna are cool and likeable, so for me there is finally no issue with HMs forcing your travelling party to be full of pokes you aren't that keen on, happy dayz
in diamond, i'm using bibarel for waterfall, strength and rock climb, drifblim for fly, defog and cut (? how does it cut? weird and wonderful) and the awesome azumarill has rock smash and surf.
in gold, they were spread out, my furret, the only poke i've ever gotten to level 100, had cut, as far as i remember, meganium had flash, the red gyarados had surf, whirlpool and waterfall, and pidgeotto had fly, i think onyx had strength and rock smash or rock climb, it's been a while.
annoying stuff, but they're going in the right direction with these moves i think
edit - forgot to add that some of the HMs are actually really good moves anyway; surf hits everyone but it's so powerful and cool to watch, and fly takes 2 turns but you're out of range to almost any attack on the first one and it's also really powerful; strength isn't too bad either; only cut is a bit flaccid a move.