Long ago someone noticed that the generous author of Perl left a few hundred million dollars of market share just lying around for the taking, and they took it!

The PHP Corporation has made many gains at Perl's expense over the years:

"In 1999, their company Zend Technologies was formally established and received initial funding from the Israeli venture capital funds Platinum Neurone Ventures and Walden Israel."

"In July 2004, Zend Technologies raised $8M in a series C funding and established its headquarters in the USA."

"In January 2005 Intel Capital and SAP Ventures joined the existing investors in Zend Technologies."

"In August 2006 Zend raised $20 Million in a series D funding."

"In October 2015, Rogue Wave Software acquired Zend."

All those years of Perl bashing by PHP dweebs was well funded by VC capital. I have no proof that PHP Inc. is involved with viral marketing campaigns against their main competitor that continue to this day (the regular perl is dead blogs from seemingly random "folks" online). So that's just speculation but seems like an obvious marketing strategy.

Google gives free py classes. That costs money. By teaching py for free they create "popularity" out of thin air (filled with cash).

Images of trebuchets stationed in front of Larry's house now exist, in my head, thanks to you :-). All I can see there is an old Pacer with faded green paint. Larry moved out on July 19, 2000 and left us to guard the fort while he builds a new galaxy class starship. Wanna take a ride???