Right, gotcha. I wouldn't throw a framework like Angular, Ember, or Backbone into the mix right away though. They have a lot of moving parts. The thing I like

Right, gotcha. I wouldn't throw a framework like Angular, Ember, or Backbone into the mix right away though. They have a lot of moving parts. The thing I like about React is that it's just a view layer, and can be a very simple one at that. A beginner could start putting things on the screen very quickly, then pick up a framework or larger app architecture later on. Not only is it a way to get started quickly, but the core concepts of a view layer learned through React would be applicable in larger frameworks.