You're not missing anything. What you and the author are describing (in terms of pattern/architecture) has existed for quite a while but was widely popularized

You're not missing anything. What you and the author are describing (in terms of pattern/architecture) has existed for quite a while but was widely popularized recently by Facebook's [Flux](https://facebook.github.io/flux https://facebook.github.io/flux). The author is either naive towards current state of the JavaScript landscape or their just being arrogant about what is actually unique to 'functional' programming.