IMO when Perl was the only alternative for fast programming, it got many attention.
When other scripting languages appeared, they, of course, distract attention.
However I don't see perl comunity as shrinking...

Also, consider following evolution -

• assembler - is convenient way to write machine code.
• C - is big assembler (much more convenient to code, and still very close to hardware)
• Perl - is big C, it is very similar to C except its code more condensed and easier to write. But other scripting languages could perfectly replace Perl.
• XXXXX - is big Perl. At this step something special should be invented... Is it perl6? :)