Don't you think that the Monastery would work the same if we didn't have XP, only node reputation?
I can only guess. I think that the Monastery would be as great as it is now, if not better, if we had only node reps without individual XPs. That's consistent with my impression that the immediate effect of voting has a far greater impact on the quality of the whole "PM experience" than does its cumulative longitudinal effect on individual XPs. But if one got rid of node reps, even with a rockin' CB, I think that PM would not be that much better a Perl community than, say, comp.lang.perl.misc. (IMO, as an "internet community" PM blows clpm out of the water, no question; this is no comment on the intelligence, talent, and depth of knowledge one can find in clpm, which can be every bit as impressive as any found here, but rather on the ethos and mores of that community compared to PMs.)