Not sure how easy it is to tell in this video as the quality leaves a little to be desired, but I heard Theresa O'Grady asked recently (maybe during an interview segment with Enda Scahill for an American Banjo Museum program?) about whether she used DUDDUD for jig picking and she said that she uses DUDUDU. She's mainly known as a tenor banjo player but in this clip she's playing mandolin (a Jack Spira one if I recall correctly).
Ultimately it doesn't matter what way you use as long as you can make it sound like a jig - I agree with ampyjoe that if someone isn't getting that jig feel in their playing and they also are using DUDUDU picking then switching to DUDDUD may facilitate them better getting the emphasis needed.
I wouldn't think of advice to use DUDDUD as "trendy" - you tend to be influenced by who taught you or who's workshops you've attended. Many of the folks I've had lessons from advise DUDDUD when starting out so that's how I've always played. I've never found DUDDUD hard or difficult to use but clearly YMMV. In the tenor banjo world there are players like Theresa O'Grady and Kieran Hanrahan who use DUDUDU, and folks like Enda Scahill who advise either, stating that depending on which method you use you'll get a different feel to your jigs - in his first Irish Banjo Tutor he states that "Down Up Down Down UP Down will achieve a strong rhythmical effect; Down Up Down Up Down Up a more lyrical effect".
While I agree that the addition of ornaments and variation add expression and are part and parcel of playing irish trad, it's the proper emphasis of those notes that makes a jig sound like a jig, a reel sound like a reel, a hornpipe sound like a hornpipe etc. etc - otherwise they're just a bunch of notes. I've heard plenty of examples of novice players playing a "jig", using triplets and trebles, but because they're playing it monotonously, with no accents, it doesn't sound like a jig. At a recent Brona Graham tenor banjo workshop she sent out recordings of the tunes learnt (a jig, reel and hornpipe) to the students - one version played without ornaments and one with the addition of them. The plain versions were not lacking in feel whatsoever and really showed how a great player can play a tune plainly and still with great feeling. Obviously the addition of ornaments really lifted the tunes, but if you can't play the tune plainly with feeling to begin with then no amount of ornaments is going make up for that.
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