You do realize TFA is about putting J2EE to rest, don't you? I'm well aware of Java's qualities on the backend, but ignoring browser innovation for 10 years (iPhone and the push for responsive) or even 15 years (Ajax) isn't good advice IMHO.
For better or worse, the same developer attitude and deployment constraints that made Java developers never look beyond the Java ecosystem is happening with Node.js developers, now that Java doesn't give you a full stack anymore (ignoring gwt and echo, which have been deprecated for 5+ years now as well).
Talking about fads, the so modern JavaScript frameworks now have discovered how to optimize user experience on mobile by doing, guess what, server side rendering!
My point being that these frameworks are chosen because the options are limited to what's available on the JVM, trading last-gen Java know-how against younger (and sexier) know-how.
It's also a miracle to me why JavaScript isn't more popular with Java developers, of all people, when in fact Java has two mature JavaScript engines, and JavaScript certainly is interesting from a bridge/migration perspective. Years ago Oracle and RedHat had even partial Node.js ports, but it never went very far.
I guess from the Java perspective, Javascript does not look too sexy, as it is a small but dangerous / unhelpful language with an uncompetitive-to-Java library ecosystem. TypeScript is great however.
React, Webpack, CSS compilers and pretty much all other modern frontend (compile-time) asset tools are running on Node.js and install from npmjs.com. Node.js is also perfect for a shallow web-facing container developed along with the front-end as a complement to Java-based (mini/SOA/whatever)-services. So I think it's quite useful to make Node.js workloads run under the JVM.
Not yet another packaging tool or fait-divers like pad left.
And the majority of them written in pure Java, not C++ wrapped in a JavaScript API.
I was specifically talking about web libraries/tools, though. Nobody is saying Java backend development must be abandoned in general.
Hint, you don't. Just hope that the browser does a good job with print to PDF, or run a server side pile of shell scripts, using LaTeX and Postscript, instead of a plain simple library.
And this is just one example from many, where JavaScript/Web sucks on the front-end.
Also Android is front-end development.
Fads come and go, Java stays strong.
Many enterprise favor having mature technologies they can count on.
A responsible consultant should never advise customers adopting the cool JavaScript framework of the Month (TM), unless it is for building curriculum and write cool "We migrated to tech XXXX" blog posts.