Indeed :) I hope that the recent benevolence to the TPF is allowed to assist you personally in the goal.

The thought train that lead to my asking the question was my starting to wonder if there weren't some minimal subset of changes to Perl 5 syntax and semantics that might act as a halfway house between Perl 5 and Perl 6.

A clean break from the backward compatibility yoke, but that required minimal changes to existing sources,in order to accomodate the clean up and removal of long (technically or emotionally) "deprecated" parts of Perl 5 whilst retaining broad compatibility. And whether this cleaned up and enhanced (without extreme additions) language might be sufficiently simpler than the full-blown Perl 6 spec to allow it to a) be avialable more quickly; b) acts as a migration path to the full deal.

I realise that there have been several similar proposals (and even starts:Ponie?) in the past, but my thought was that maybe the combination of a) not slavish adherance to Perl 5 compatibilty; b) not the full gusto of Perl 6 enhancements; c) just enough changes to fix a few pertinent, long-standing beefs and wish-list items; might give the idea impetous.

However, given the proposals ideas put forward in this thread so far, there does not seem to be a common subset of desires, nor even a common direction. Everyone seems to want different things from "the next Perl" and each would pull it in a different, and usually conflicting direction.

Which only goes to show what a complex and thankless task you set yourself with the open design process you started those years ago, and what a remarkable balancing act you've had to pull to achieve the level of consensus you achieved. I read somewhere earlier today a statement that went something like: "individuals think better than commitees". But at least commitees have finite numbers of minds, and each member represents and filters the desires (aims; goals; prejudices;) of the many minds that sit behinds them.

I once flirted with the notion that in the modern, internet-connected world, democracy should replace MPs (political representatives in governmental forums) with one-man, one-electronic-vote, directly upon the issues themselves. The idea is attractive for many reasons, not least because it would render party politics impotent.

I've seen it dismissed on various grounds, most commonly the scare-mongering and emminently technologically fixable problem of ensuring security, privacy and freedom from electronic ballot stuffing. I've recently come to realise that the single biggest barrier to the removal of the "representative" from the mix, is the inherent and very valuable filtering role they perform.

I do not envy you your task. And if I could see a way of helping, without adding to the drag of controversy, I would. Another quote I read recently comes to mind: "Deliberate with caution, but act with decision; and yield with graciousness, or oppose with firmness." I'm pretty good at two of those, and a third is within my grasp (with some effort). But the fourth is something I've always struggled with and it seems to be getting harder as I get older.