OTOH, what about distribution "tarballs" in '.zip' format? They don't use tar at all ... Time to deprecate them maybe? Is anybody actually using them? And while at it, what about the even more obscure 'shar' format?
FWIW, I think they should still be supported. I see recent distributions on ftp.gnu.org using both -- gzip and tar make shar archives for the sake of bootstrapping, and some packages use zip to make things easier for Windows users. One could certainly make arguments about getting rid of them (especially shar), nevertheless. I personally wouldn't want to spend time engaging in that debate :). k