You don't need to bundle every module in CPAN to use it, and I wouldn't want a stable.tgz that had everything in it.

It really doesn't take that much effort to install Perl modules, and the ones that do take effort aren't going to install any easier if they are in the core.

It isn't an issue of technology. We could just make the distribution huge. That would be a lot of wasted effort, though.

There is a small issue of quality. The Perl core is pretty well tested. That isn't true for a lot of CPAN.

In most cases it's not a legal issue since most modules have the same license as Perl.

It's just not a good idea because it doesn't gain you any real benefit. If you magically solved this problem, the same people would find something else to complain about. It's not that they don't use Perl because the core set of modules is so small; it's usually something else, such as firewall policies, ignorance, or just plain stubborness.

Sure, Java and .NET may have huge installers, but the minimal size of CPAN barely fits on a CD, and most people aren't going to use most of that. Why would you want to wait for 600 MB to download just to get Perl?

You could argue for a fat distribution, but you can already make that yourself. Get a copy of a minicpan and there you are. You bundle your script as a normal Perl distribution and let CPAN.pm handle the rest.

And, you forgot to mention which other modules you thought should be part of core.