That's precisely the problem, design trends don't really matter, especially for a productive app like Github (vs something like a marketing site).
Look at how information dense Excel can be with a typical spreadsheet, and the vast majority of users have no problem with it - yet when it comes to a basic page listing a few items, there's 50px of padding around each item in 12px font. Suggestions: remove the padding, group actions by the same person or same repo to remove repeated clutter, add descriptions of the repos in the front page so it doesnt require a click to see more, etc...
Look at how information dense Excel can be with a typical spreadsheet, and the vast majority of users have no problem with it - yet when it comes to a basic page listing a few items, there's 50px of padding around each item in 12px font. Suggestions: remove the padding, group actions by the same person or same repo to remove repeated clutter, add descriptions of the repos in the front page so it doesnt require a click to see more, etc...