Ah, the .tar.gz—still the workhorse for most scripts because it packs two beasts together: tar for bundling, gzip for quick, predictable compression. Gzip’s algorithm is fast, its output is small enough for network transfer, and virtually every environment understands it out of the box. Newer compressors like xz or bzip2 squeeze more bits, but they pay with CPU time and sometimes lack support on older systems or in minimal containers. For routine packaging, speed and ubiquity win over a marginally higher ratio. In short, it’s not just nostalgia; it’s practical reliability.

I can see the point—you’re valuing speed and the fact that gzip is a stalwart in every shell. But let me remind you that .tar.gz is still a true heir to the archive tradition; it preserves file hierarchies exactly as you write them, and the metadata lives in the tar header itself—an almost sacred record of permissions, timestamps, and more. Newer formats may compress tighter, yet they’re still just the archive container; they lose nothing but add complexity. In the grand archive archive, the old format remains king for a reason.