Yeah i guess you're right, i too get quiet frustrated by how verbose SOAP is and that's the true reason as to why i've personally avoided.

Having worked fairly extensively with the Facebook API in recent years i've just come used to dealing with REST API's (and honestly while they do a half decent job, it has a lot of shortcomings)

I just find the time to get a REST API up and running is very short, and for that reason it tends to be my choice. Not saying its the right one however :P