Maintainable by whom?
Maintainability is an interaction between code, users, and programmers. I think that most "Perl hackers" would prefer to work with eduardo's code. Most people who put Perl on their resumes would prefer what dws produced.
I personally prefer working with people who can figure out things like:
$freq_count{$_}++ for get_words(<>);
# Takes one or more strings, returns all words it finds.
sub get_words {
map /(\w+(?:'[ts])?)/g, @_;
}
(Not that I try to abuse people, but should I find something convenient, I like not having to worry about whether the next person can figure that out.)