I just saw this column in Dr. Dobb's the other day. Paul Jansen, managing director of TIOBE Software discusses the popularity of programming languages.

His response to a question about "which languages are losing ground" mentioned C, C++, and Perl. The kicker is his reason for Perl's imminent demise: "...everyone has been waiting on a new major release for more than seven years. That is considered far too long."

In response to the earlier question about languages that are gaining ground, Jansen said "Python managed to reach the top 10 because it is the truly object-oriented successor of Perl."

Ugh. You could easily wonder if he has a personal grudge against Perl for some reason. Both those statements are silly, IMHO. But it's more evidence that Perl's image is not in very good shape.