> I don't know, I feel like Node.js has a fairly full-featured and useful standard library?
IMO not really. We have many Java and JS projects where I work, I can't find a single Java project that has bigger dependencies than even our smallest JS project, or even an empty "create react app". One of our Java projects is 200k+ lines and still has smaller dependencies than create react app or a empty project created with angular cli.
In JS, it's normal to pull in 500+ libraries and this is only because the standard library is so lacking. Our Java projects, even massive ones, pull in less than 100.
In Java you also have Guava and Apache Commons. Those cover about 95% of data structure needs for a project not covered by the JVM. JS has nothing comparable.
People lament about how "big" the JVM is, but you trade complexity of the VM for complexity of your own app. In practice Java projects are smaller and use less space and memory because your dependencies aren't using 10 different libraries to pad whitespace.
This also makes it much easier to mentally transition between Java projects. If they were built in the last decade, they're probably using the standard library, Guava/Commons, hibernate, and some HTTP interface. I can move between Java projects at work no problem, but if it's Node or front-end 90% of the time I'm going to spend a few days learning a new framework to get anything done.
Small standard libraries are very harmful to the ecosystem. I hope to God they do it right with Deno, batteries included like Python and Java