> Let's go ahead and compare with Twisted, shall we?

Oh goodness, yes.

How about an echo server. This one is from the twisted home page, so I am not knocking down a strawman.

    from twisted.internet import protocol, reactor
    
    class Echo(protocol.Protocol):
        def dataReceived(self, data):
            self.transport.write(data)
    
    class EchoFactory(protocol.Factory):
        def buildProtocol(self, addr):
            return Echo()
    
    reactor.listenTCP(1234, EchoFactory())
    reactor.run()

Versus in node you can do:

    var net = require('net');
    net.createServer(function (stream) {
        stream.pipe(stream)
    }).listen(5000)

This is what I mean by limited surface area. I shouldn't need to define 2 classes to write an echo server. An Echo class AND an EchoFactory? And on top of that I need to mess with a reactor? How does that pass for good API design?