When they first built the University of California at Irvine they just put the buildings in. They did not put any sidewalks, they just planted grass. The next year, they came back and put the sidewalks where the trails were in the grass. Perl is just that kind of language. It is not designed from first principles. Perl is those sidewalks in the grass.

I wouldn't ever write the full sentence myself, but then, I never use goto either.

Over the long term, symbiosis is more useful than parasitism. More fun, too. Ask any mitochondria.

Guilty as charged. Perl is happily ugly, and happily derivative.

An initial underscore already conveys strong feelings of magicalness to a C programmer.

You want it in one line? Does it have to fit in 80 columns?

Information doesn't want to be free. Information wants to be valuable.