rosso the biggest difference is that node.js(the technology not the admin) is the game changer, npm (node package manager) the database of java snippets that is at the core of node.js is what makes everything so awesome, anyone can budge in and do what ever they would find useful to share with others. also node.js is very fast compared to java alone and nxt is made on java!!! Read here: https://strongloop.com/strongblog/node-js-is-faster-than-java/