Probably at least 1/2 the birders I know record full lists of the birds they see. Actually, among Americans, it's almost all. Perhaps it's a cultural divide. eBird being US based and full of US employees and all...
Yeah, we've all been there. It's happened to me tons and tons of time. At some point, whether 1x1km squares or hot spots, you still have to understand habitat and know how to bird, and even then local knowledge is key and that details can be missing in both systems. Really, none of the systems are perfect. Observado can provide some very precise locations but it's just random dots for good birds over time, it's not nearly as flush / complete as eBird despite all of eBird's limitations. I'm not defending eBird here, I would love more precise data when available. Again, not to really defend hot spots (I have lots of complaints) but slowly but surely, hotspots are breaking up / getting more granular and 30km long hotspots are less common than they used to be. It still doesn't mean it's a great solution but from an end user's perspective it's a bit better over time