10 reasons why every developer SHOULD learn React

Earlier today I saw an article with “15 reasons why every developer should learn Angular”. So, moved by jealousy and fear that all developers could actually prefer Angular and leave me behind with my React knowledge, I decided to wrote the “12 reasons why you SHOULD learn React”:

1. Facebook did it
   Facebook is an amazing company with incredible engineers. The fact that they created React should immediately lend credibility to the library.
2. It’s easier to reason about.
   State (specially state changing over time) is the root of all bugs in modern application development. By using Virtual DOM, React completely removes the need for State from any application, making everything easier to reason about. And if you absolutely need state in your application, you can use Redux or a different library completely focused on State such as Cycle.js. (React and Cycle are actually very similar — except for the fact that while React follows a reactive pattern, Cycle.js follows a cyclic one).
3. It’s just the “V”
   MVC is an antiquated pattern created for small, talking systems of the 80s. Why bother with the M and the C when they have no use on the web?
4. Everybody is talking about it
   Let’s be pragmatic — “Cool” is not enough. If you want to land a job, You need to learn something that is spreading crazily across the industry, so fast that everybody is hiring and nobody really knows how to differentiate a good React developer from a bad one.
5. Unleash the power of functional & reactive programming
   Functional programming has its roots on LISP (Latin/Iberian/Spanish Programmers) and is experiencing a renaissance due to inclusive and non-discriminatory policies on large technology companies. Together with reactive programming (another word for “Object-oriented”), it’s a highly demanded skill for new professionals.
6. It’s the last thing you’re ever gonna need to learn
   React can be used to produce web applications, native mobile apps, command line interfaces, avionics and much more. Why keep using a framelibrary that has only one purpose (like Angular?) when you can learn a single one for everything, forever?
7. Used by Instagram, Netflix, Paypal, Apple and many more.
   React has a broad penetration across the industry. Apple, for example, is reportedly creating an autonomous car using React while Netflix publicly endorses and is said to be producing an original series based on React’s history.
8. It’s not what it looks like…
   This post is a joke — an ode to poorly written and misleading articles. In case you missed, these are all absurd and purposely wrong affirmations.
   If you really want to know more about React, this is a great place to start: https://github.com/petehunt/react-howto