[extension]

You can't satisfy the HATEOAS constraint by simply returning URLs in the JSON response from your API. The structure of the data is still tightly coupled to your own application, and so must be any client that can make use of it.

It is essential that RESTful applications be able to evolve independently from the client. To allow this, they must use forms of hypermedia generic enough to serve as the engine for all present and future versions of the application. If the client has any code specific to your app, then your app is not RESTful in any scope beyond its own.

I'm not convinced that the whole resource vs action thing is all that important to REST. It's an ideal that has been largely ignored in practice and the web has been quite successful without it. Contrast this with HATEOAS which has been the unavoidable reality of the web since day one.