Just to clarify

my $in = param('place'),
my $place = seewhatsthere(
  data     => $in,
  field    => 'Place',
);
[download]

That's a way. The key is to not use param() in a list context. You can force scalar context as you have done (by assigning to a scalar) or you can use the scalar operator like so:

my %hash = (
   data  => scalar param('place'),
   field => 'place',
);
[download]

PerlJam

I see. I don't seem to have that problem when the param value is from a input field of type 'text' or type 'password'. To make my question more concrete, here's an example

# html
<tr><td>Username<td><td><input type="text" name="username" size="25"><
+/td></tr>

# cgi
my $username = seewhatsthere(
  data     => param('username'),
  field    => 'Username',
);

sub seewhatsthere {
  my %hash = @_;
  html_start();
  print Dumper(%hash);
  exit(0);
}

# Dumped
$VAR1 = 'data'; $VAR2 = ''; $VAR3 = 'field'; $VAR4 = 'Username';
[download]

In the above case, even though the username is not filled, the dumped output is as expected. Which means that if the input type is 'text', passing param() to a list is permissible ( as shown in the code ). Am I getting it right?