Should we rebrand REST?
&quot;there&#x27;s just far too much confusion about what REST means to rescue it&quot;<p>No, there is no confusing. REST is exactly what&#x27;s in Roy Fielding&#x27;s thesis. Anything as is derived from REST, often with dismal ends. RESTful, RESTlike, RESTish are weasel words designed to say something along the lines of &#x27;It&#x27;s REST, but with these additions&#x27;, or &#x27;It&#x27;s REST, but with these constraints loosened&#x27;, or a mix of both.<p>I was there at the beginning of SOA in 2004 and SOA then was an amazingly useful concept that worked well. The term SOA was hijacked to mean so many things, often by consultants pitching their version of SOA enablement or training, and at a rapid pace. By 2009 the meaning of SOA was so buzzwordy and clouded that people were trying to invent new terms to refer to the original concept.<p>If someone wants to create a new thing, create a new thing and give attribution to the shoulders you stand on (i.e., ABC is based on REST but is different in these ways..1,2,3).