Quote Pile
The following are miscellous quotes from various sources (articles, blogs, books, whatever) that I've read that I feel are worth isolating.
Perl's decline was cultural
An unfortunate feedback loop in this kind of "perilous" environment is that it easily turns prideful. It's difficult to thrive here, if you survive and do well you are skilled; you've performed feats; you should mark your rites of passage. This can become a dangerous culture trap. If you're not careful about it, you may start to think of the hazards and difficulties, the "foot guns", as necessary features - they teach you those essential survival skills that mark you out. More unkindly, they keep the stupid folk out, and help preserve the high status of those who survived long enough to be assimilated. Uh-oh, now you've invented class politics.
The problem with this thinking is that it's self-reinforcing. Working hard to master system complexities was genuinely rewarding - you really were doing difficult things and doing them well. This is actually the same mechanism behind what eventually became known as 'meritocracy', but the core point is simpler - if difficulty itself becomes a badge of honour, you've created a trap: anything that makes the system more approachable starts to feel like it's cheapening what you achieved. You become invested in preserving the barriers you overcame.
This whole articles is a interesting look into the Perl community and it's culture. It's honestly a pattern across human history. Overcoming strife leads people to having pride in their struggle. That pride then starts to strangle the community. Any attempts to build bridges, lower barriers, and build communal knowledge gets impeded.
If there is any subculture you value, this mentality will strangle it. This article further mentions how this culture enables abusive "genius" minds to be tolerated. Struggle must never be forgotten, but its memory must be used to uplift rather than close off, gatekeep, and become conserivative politcs.
While convience can be a trap, be equally as untrusting to people that demand others to struggle. That cruelty is addicitive and poisonous.