1. Zip uses a different algorithm than gzip - the results are not necessarily equivalent.
2. If the HTML is static, which seems to be the case (since it's generated manually from the SWF), you can pre-gzip them instead of forcing the server to do it on demand - that'll reduce latency and CPU usage. Therefore "on the wire" is not really relevant.
1. Zip uses a different algorithm than gzip - the results are not necessarily equivalent.
2. If the HTML is static, which seems to be the case (since it's generated manually from the SWF), you can pre-gzip them instead of forcing the server to do it on demand - that'll reduce latency and CPU usage. Therefore "on the wire" is not really relevant.