I know it is (badly) contrived, but the point is clear. It would be worth this companies dollars, which wouldn't harm the perl R&D process either, to pay a reasonable sum to ensure that this feature remained inplace against the wishes of those who wish it to be removed.

Well, yes -- but so what? I think there's a good chance that Larry and many others in the core aren't necessarily concerned with what's worthwhile to a specific company. It sounds horrific, pardon me saying so if you would, to have various companies bidding on new features, especially based on the bonehead decisions companies make sometimes.

I mean, a stupid feature is added based on "contributor needs" here, and another feature is dropped for the same reason there, and eventually we've got the movie industry of the 40s-60s. (The possibly apocryphal anecdote concerning a movie set before electric razors and backed by a razor company comes to mind. (Roughly, that the film was required by the company to include an electric razor if someone were filmed shaving.)) "Producers" driving development into the ground because they cannot make smart decisions. (If they could make smart decisions, they wouldn't be producers; producers by definition are prized for their money and nothing else. If they had talent, they'd be in the show...working for a producer. :\ )

While it would be nice if some company felt all warm and fuzzy about Perl development in the short run, I like to think that Larry looks at Perl as another child of his. He wouldn't get a Nike logo tattooed on his human child's forehead, and he wouldn't make Perl into something it "shouldn't" be, in his terms.

Not saying it couldn't be done. I'm saying it wouldn't, and that the positive effects are not as significant as they might seem.

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You are what you think.

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