Well if the API moves to a different domain name, HATEOAS will not help you one wit. You still need to hardcode the entry point. I still don't see any reasonab

Well if the API moves to a different domain name, HATEOAS will not help you one wit. You still need to hardcode the entry point. I still don't see any reasonable scenario where an API would change the (site-relative) URL's without also changing the semantics of the API. And if the semantics change you would have to rewrite the client anyway. In any case, if you change the URL's without changing the semantics you should respond 301 on the old URL, so even a client with hardcoded URL's would work correctly without the need for HATEOAS.