SOAP and finally some REST !!

Since I work in the EAI/Web Services field, I am not new to the REST vs SOAP debate; For a while, I have been thinking that it is more of a choice in a web service design
Fortunately I came across a very good article on the REST vs SOAP debate yesterday and now realize that the issue is much deeper than that;
It seems to me that debate falls along the lines of other common debates between - practicians vs theorists, generalists vs specialists, strongly typed interfaces vs weakly typed interfaces , KISS vs complicated , bottom-up vs top-down and so on.

Why is it that we in the Software Industry always seem to have to deal with so many philosophical arguments, unlike other industries? I guess this has to do with Software being much more malleable , than , say most metals.

Networking in Silicon Valley

If you are in Silicon Valley, there are a number of avenues to meet interesting people in Technology. You can attend events on a number of topics of your interest and they don't cost that much to attend. Here are some of the organizations which I attend whenever I get time.

a)SD Forum - www.sdforum.org

SD Forum is very much useful when you want to keep in touch with the latest Technical trends in the industry. They have various SIG's (Special Interest Groups) which you can attend and many startup founders present their technology in the relevant SIG's.

They also serve as incubator to companies and I heard that Sugar CRM incubated in SD Forum offices.

b)TIE (The Indus Entrepreneurs)
c)SVPMA(Silicon Valley Product Management Association)
d)Churchill Club