these are things I’ve noticed without any experience of autorepair beyond “here’s how internal combustion engines work”
See what I mean? It's a bar that most people don't cross.
also knowing how an internal combustion engine works is not equivalent to knowing that html code goes in angle braces. it’s more equivalent to knowing that you need to use a certain type of wrench when working on a certain type of car (I don’t know if this is actually true because I don’t know how to fix cars, but it’s more equivalent)
Agreed, and I would guess that is the extent of what people do with that observation. They see it, and have no clue why or how or what that means. Is it only certain browsers that do it, or does it depend on if it's a phone or laptop? Maybe it's a AT&T service feature on phones now? Or maybe just iPhones do it. Maybe it's only on previously visited sites? Or maybe it's a virus or a scam of some sort.
People with no frame of reference see things very differently. It's a magic box.