There is a huge and contentious debate under way right now related to "Web services". A sizable contingent of the W3C and various XML pioneers are challenging the value of SOAP, WSDL, and other "Web service" technology.

This is a nuanced discussion with many different positions being taken by the opponents. Some are critical of the W3C's participation in something viewed as a "pay to play" maneuver from Microsoft and IBM. Others are pointing out serious flaws in SOAP itself. To me, the most interesting challenge comes from the W3C's Technical Architecture Group (TAG). This is the group tasked with defining what the web is and is not. Several of the TAG, including the president of the Apache Foundation, are arguing that "Web services" as defined by SOAP, fundamentally are not "the web". ("The web" being defined crudely as "things are named via URI's" and "every time I ask for the same URI, I get the same results". My definition, not theirs.) With a "Web service", a URI doesn't name a thing, it names a process. What I get when I ask for a URI is no longer dependent solely on the state of the thing itself. Instead, what I get depends on my path through the application.

I'd encourage you to all sample this debate, as summarized by Simon St. Laurent (one of the original XML designers).