What is the parameter “next” used for in Express?

It passes control to the next matching route. In the example you give, for instance, you might look up the user in the database if an id was given, and assign it to req.user.

Below, you could have a route like:

app.get("https://stackoverflow.com/users", function(req, res) {
  // check for and maybe do something with req.user
});

Since /users/123 will match the route in your example first, that will first check and find user 123; then /users can do something with the result of that.

Route middleware is a more flexible and powerful tool, though, in my opinion, since it doesn’t rely on a particular URI scheme or route ordering. I’d be inclined to model the example shown like this, assuming a Users model with an async findOne():

function loadUser(req, res, next) {
  if (req.params.userId) {
    Users.findOne({ id: req.params.userId }, function(err, user) {
      if (err) {
        next(new Error("Couldn't find user: " + err));
        return;
      }

      req.user = user;
      next();
    });
  } else {
    next();
  }
}

// ...

app.get('/user/:userId', loadUser, function(req, res) {
  // do something with req.user
});

app.get('/users/:userId?', loadUser, function(req, res) {
  // if req.user was set, it's because userId was specified (and we found the user).
});

// Pretend there's a "loadItem()" which operates similarly, but with itemId.
app.get('/item/:itemId/addTo/:userId', loadItem, loadUser, function(req, res) {
  req.user.items.append(req.item.name);
});

Being able to control flow like this is pretty handy. You might want to have certain pages only be available to users with an admin flag:

/**
 * Only allows the page to be accessed if the user is an admin.
 * Requires use of `loadUser` middleware.
 */
function requireAdmin(req, res, next) {
  if (!req.user || !req.user.admin) {
    next(new Error("Permission denied."));
    return;
  }

  next();
}

app.get('/top/secret', loadUser, requireAdmin, function(req, res) {
  res.send('blahblahblah');
});

Hope this gave you some inspiration!