It's unclear to me how P6 was a harsher environment for core contributors than P5 could have, would have been attempting to do similar things against the grain of a fairly ossified culture and spec by tradition; not to be pejorative; I have only praise and gratitude for all porters on all projects; they make my development life possible. It seemed like there was just as much community resistance and apathy for P5 forks as there was for P6.

From outside the Perlsphere Perl5 is largely considered a dead end and sub signatures and such wouldn't have altered that perception because it's a brand and application/library problem more than a language problem. If we're talking about wasted energy, there is a legitimate case to be made that it's what all Perl devs are expending since there are several good alternatives outstripping Perl in marketshare, new features, and problem domains. Again, that's devil's advocate. I love Perl and only code because Perl exists whether or not it's a cul-de-sac in which my career may be forever parked.