Java is widespread. Whether it's important or not depends on the project. It's not so much that Java has a steep learning curve, it's that Java has the Java way

Java is widespread. Whether it's important or not depends on the project. It's not so much that Java has a steep learning curve, it's that Java has the Java way of doing things (namely, object-oriented programming taken to the extreme) and you are required to do things that way. It's less flexible than Python in the way you can write your code. You have to have a firm grasp of object-oriented programming to do anything in Java. There's a lot of theory you have to learn just to get started, which in Python can just be brushed aside until you're ready to tackle it. And with Java, you're probably going to need a heavyweight IDE instead of just being able to use a plain text editor or a REPL or other interactive environment (which Java doesn't have).