I, for one, haven't exactly been biting my nails waiting for the occasionally-rocky-but-overall-friendly nature of Perl Monks to turn into a newbie-hostile, old-boys network with scads of unwritten rules, cabals, and conspiracies.

If you have a disagreement with someone, take it up with the other person. Don't piss in the community well -- you drink from it too.

I'm not going to defend everything merlyn says, thinks, or does, but I do appreciate his knowledge and experience and the fact that despite hostility from certain quarters, he shares it at no cost. (Not just here on Perl Monks, but via e-mail and on his web site.) You might even ask him what his exact voting criteria are -- I highly doubt he votes up technically incorrect posts.

What have you contributed to the monastery today besides this?

Update: I've thought about this a little, and I'm a little ashamed that I spoke so harsly. I apologize to the rather-harshly pseudonymed monk.

I still think your comments are off the mark, however -- it seems to me that you're guilty of the same sin you accuse others of doing, namely, devoting so much time to the affairs of merlyn.

A single vote per writeup one way or the other doesn't really make a difference, and there are enough of us at higher levels who browse Worst Nodes regularly to counteract any effect you might have with your crusade. I suggest rather that you take what merlyn says with a grain of salt, breathe deeply now and then, and seek to help out other people where you can.

Best regards,
chromatic

... Super Monk to the Rescue ...

Or maybe not.

Now I dislike blind enthusiasm based on the person as much as the next person. (Possibly more in fact.) Specifically I will be the first to say that merlyn and I see eye to eye on some things and not on some others. (If you can't guess what we don't agree on, and you are not merlyn, then it is none of your business.)

Now I saw the chatter comment. I took that as typical Randal. When he sees comments that he thinks are good, or makes ones he cares about, he publicizes it. Was the mention of merlyn the reason for the ++? I rather strongly doubt it. Rather it was a description of nodes that he wanted people to look for in Newest Nodes and think about. Certainly plenty of posts that mention merlyn have been passed by without comment.

I don't know your definition of a "Merlyn Groupy". Do I count? I admit to making a point to look at what he writes, and I vote for him reasonably frequently. OTOH I have a specific reason for each ++ and I will post a correction any time I think he made a technical mistake.

Of course he is hardly the only person that I make sure not to miss posts by. A short list of some of the others in no particular order? tye, btrott, lhoward, chromatic, jcwren, Ovid...and plenty more!

Now are there people who will ++ anything that he writes? Unfortunately, yes. I don't like that either. But a blanket -- is just as bad if not worse than a blanket ++.

If you think people are misvoting, speak up! I certainly did when I thought that people shouldn't vote a blanket ++ for me to counteract the blanket -- votes I was getting! But it really doesn't help if you (whoever you are) start misvoting just because someone else does!

Wow, am I under a microscope, or what? {grin}

-- Randal L. Schwartz, Perl hacker

<big smile> merlyn, I don't usually ++ you (I mean, what's the point? You're all super-duper saint. I guy like me patting you on the back is like a dog telling the Iron Chef "that was pretty good squid, man.") but that's funny. The Monastary officially cracks me up. Fat props to chromatic, supermonk, vroom and all the other old-timers who've maintained their sanity, reason and senses of humor throughout. Even merlyn, despite his hideous pride (not to mention his gluttony, avarice, wrath, sloth, lust and envy)

The Autonomic Pilot; it's FunkyTown, babe.

Regardless if this is true or not, I think it's unfair to hide behind a pseudonym, if you're regular users of this place.

Wow, is this like an experiment in negativity or what?

Methinks he just wanted to lower the $NORM value

--
$you = new YOU;
honk() if $you->love(perl)