It’s a 32 year old format that makes pictures worse in order to save space. A lot changes in the tech works in 30 years. While there may be nothing inherently wrong with it, there’s far better image encoding algorithms these days that can store images in less space without reducing the quality as much.
This is correct, and this part of the system works fine. What should have happened though is a population break point where a state has to break up if they exceed a certain population. CA should be at least 3 states. New York needs a split as well, probably a few others. There is no way a state can serve its population well when the population is measured in the tens of millions.