I can see how many applications might want to read the page, but in my case it's not necessary. My extension tries to add a <div> under the <body> element, regardless of what's going on in the page. If there's no <body>, my extension stops working but the browser keeps going.
In short, if there were separate "read" and "write" permissions, I would only need "write". For privacy-concerned people, that's a very important distinction.
In short, if there were separate "read" and "write" permissions, I would only need "write". For privacy-concerned people, that's a very important distinction.