I think that trying to make Perl (or its community) be something it is not to gain marketshare is doomed to failure on both counts ... I don't think you'll be able to convince the Perl community to abandon the TIMTOWTDI philosophy and I don't think it would substantially change marketshare even if you could. Better to acknowledge Perl's strengths and weaknesses and apply it where it can best shine. No sense in using a phillips-head screwdriver when a flat-head is called for.

Yesterday I sat in a meeting with a PHB from another group who wanted our group (with mostly Perl expertise) to take on a project for him. He had apparently read a few magazine articles and was therefore (at least in his own mind) competent to dictate the architecture and implementation details. Unfortunately, he was unable to articulate his requirements in any way.

I mentioned I would probably use Perl in developing the GUI for his low-bandwidth, not mission-critical analytical tool, and he dismissed Perl as being unable to produce a tool sufficiently flexible for his purposes, which made me laugh.

Ultimately, however people perceive Perl, it is hard to argue with this basic fact: Perl gets stuff done. Whenever I find someone who is skeptical about using Perl to solve a problem, I ask them to give me a trial period of a week or so. I've never found anyone who thought I should switch to some other, buzzword-compliant technology, once they saw how responsive and adaptable I can be when delivering solutions in Perl.

I think it is also a little melodramatic to talk of people being fired for choosing a technology that is not buzzword-compliant. I've never seen anyone fired except for being a jerk or betraying their company's interest in a public way -- mostly we're talking about the possibility of missing a promotion because you take a risk and fail. Or perhaps I've only worked at companies that expect and forgive a certain level of risk-taking and failure. Personally, I'd rather try to do what is best for my employer (even if it means I might fail) than choose a 'safe' solution out of cowardice or personal greed.