Why is it better for the majority of users? I can see why it is better for the list providers, but what are the benefits for users by keeping it instead of having a two step change detection that reliably tell them if the list content has changed ?
I doubt the majority of used list servers used by pihole users is capable of sending the correct HTTP response.
Even one of the two remaining "default" lists don't do it. Here is the log of the second consecutive run of pihole -g
[✓] Preparing new gravity database
[i] Target: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/StevenBlack/hosts/master/hosts
[✓] Status: Retrieval successful
[i] Received 57337 domains
[i] Target: https://mirror1.malwaredomains.com/files/justdomains
[✓] Status: No changes detected
[i] Received 26853 domains