I think it's personal preference. The first images are a bit brighter. The author could probably have found some more extreme examples that illustrated his point better.

It's possible the author considers the highlights in the first images to be "blown out".

There's no right and wrong here. I think the first shot may be a little too light and the last shot may be a little to dark. Kind of like the porridge in the three bears story! Just right would be somewhere between the other two!

Of course it somewhat depends on how you have your monitor set up. If it's set up with a brighter than average screen you may prefer the darker imagr and vice versa. You have to remember that very few people Other than photographers and graphic artists) are using calibrated monitors so what you see on your screen may not be what I see and both may be different from that the photographer sees on their screen.

See http://epaperpress.com/monitorcal/ for more on monitor calibration.