As ever, xmlhack had its collective ears and eyes open at GCA's XML Europe 2001 show this week. Here's a selection of amusing and odd quotes gleaned from the conference.

"I've never seen a topic map in my life.";
"Nor have I, and I'm not sure they're worth it."

"SOAP is a dirty hack, but it's here to stay."

"Sweden's very clubby, it's easy to get people organised."

"I believe there's a very serious need for defining opening times."

"So, do you find RDF natural to work with?"

"In my opinion XML 1.0 was kind of a kludge."

"I've been meaning to do this for some time, but I've got a real job."

"Companies spend millions of dollars each year on EDI consultants to do what you or I could do with a couple of XSLT transformations."

"I'm just going to ask a couple of questions, but nothing anyone will be stumped on." (Panel moderator to participants)

"Roughly 3 million people still write COBOL for a living."

And prize for the best Powerpoint slide of the show goes to Barbadosoft, for their description of the People in Suits application architecture.