Hacker News Reader

I'm pretty sure all this predates the existence of gas

Only slightly. System V/386 was 1987, first release of GAS was 1989 (and GCC got 386 support in 1988)

Intel format was pre-unix (probably 8080) ... and AT&T of course was from the late 70s, originally from PDPs

I am pretty sure of its status about 25 years ago.