When arrow functions were first released, they didn't support the `async` keyword. I guess that wasn't fixed until ES2018? Maybe earlier - I think Babel would compile them pretty early on. Regardless, some people who adopted async patterns early got into the habit of avoiding arrow functions entirely, so it wouldn't be crazy to me to hear someone say, "I used arrow functions before I learned async."

Otherwise, this is just restating the same arguments people already made above.

There's no practical reason why

  (() => {
  
  }());

would be useful but

  await (async () => {
  
  }());

wouldn't be. The scenario you're talking about where async code removes the need to have an anonymous function only makes sense if you were only using anonymous functions for callbacks. In practice, that's not the only (or even primary) use case for people who advocate inlining code in Javascript. They're specifically advising against the pattern where single-use functions are given names and removed from program flow.