> Stealing is usually a function of reward/effort.

Except that for digital media it's a Smart Cow Problem[1], the effort is only there for the first person who wants to circumvent it, then it becomes trivial for everyone.

However, I'd suggest that the reason some on HN react strongly to these suggestions is that they rely upon security through obscurity, which can be dangerous by providing a false sense of security when none exists. While this probably isn't as big a deal when it comes to your HTML and CSS, security is a case of err'ing on the side of caution.

[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_cow_problem

If minification and obfuscation were the only things being done, then your analogy would be sound, but tricks like this also have the effect of degrading the experience for legitimate users with javascript disabled.

Adding a dependency on javascript for static content doesn't seem like a good idea to me.

A better analogy would be wrapping plastic tape with "no trespassing" written on it around your front door, or greasing your door handle.

It's the opposite of being fool-proof: having near zero utility while degrading the experience for everyone.