I've had some concerns about GraphQL in the past when it was first coming up, but they look to be mostly addressed in some way shape or form. For example, using a CDN is now viable without hacks if you utilize something like Apollo Persisted Queries. Most of the research I've done on the topic recently has come up with a lot of outdated criticisms.
On that note, it almost feels as if people wrote off GraphQL in the beginning and have largely ignored the developments since. The people already on board the train seem to write more to an existing audience of users rather than people looking to get in.
I tend to distrust any advocacy of a piece of tech that doesn't discuss at least one trade off. Engineering is all about tradeoffs.
Why not add another URL? /getProfileByUsername?
Nothing stops you building another layer of endpoints to service your frontend.
> Nothing stops you building another layer of endpoints to service your frontend.
They could've added a new endpoint for that specific usecase but I'm assuming they've simplified their actual needs to this one example.