There Are Fates Worse Than Death: The OPW2013 Keynote
Keynote address from the 2013 Orlando Perl Workshop, describing how I think the best way for the Perl community to save itself is by spending more time with non-Perl people.
modules on CPAN • DCBPW organizer, beginners list listmom • that guy that takes a lot of pictures of food. • team lead/consultant, infinity interactive Just this guy, ya know?
technical, but instead big picture/inspirational. Plus there’s the pressure of all the great keynotes we’ve had in the Perl community. The question facing every keynote speaker: “What am I telling you for an hour that’s worth keeping you from beer?”
I said to myself, you’re a perl programmer, what do you want to hear about? And then the little asshole voice I’ve got inside my head said, “Oh, really, you’re a perl programmer, are you?”
a lot. So I said to myself, “Okay, you’re a programmer who uses Perl, what do you want to hear about in a keynote?” And then the little asshole voice said, “Oh, you’re a programmer, are you? “
• Linux • MacOS X • Git • Jira • Email • Managing my team • Managing my bosses • Managing my clients Little asshole voice said, “What else did you do last year?” So, I made another list.
Little asshole voice continued: “Hell, look, you’ve even got a Macbook Air, the laptop of managers everywhere. Developers need more RAM than that thing has.”
solver After thinking for it a bit, I realized that this is really the best description for what I do. I know a little bit about a whole lot of things, and I’m good at dropping into the middle of a messy situation, figuring out what’s up, and coming up with a solution for whatever the problem at hand is.
blog about it and ... Okay, maybe what we have is a marketing problem. I bet it’s just that people don’t know about all the cool stuff people do with Perl and how many people are still using it and stuff.
people that have been out there plugging the hell out of Perl. I think that was totally necessary, and it did make a difference -- but I also think it’s done about all it’s going to do.)
• “Hey, that gives me an idea…” - a few people • “What brand of wrench did you use on those bolts?” - NOBODY, NEVER. Initial Reactions But the cool thing about the crazy stuff is the thing that got made, not the things that were used to make the thing.
different dialects of the same Ur-language. I mean, it’s not like there aren’t a bunch of languages that have ripped off^W^Wbeen inspired by Perl’s design.
the one waiting for you to stop talking… I just started a new “dynamic languages” group in my town. First meeting, about 20 people showed up. Some Rubyists, some PHPers, a few .Net developers. I was the only person using Perl.
does a lot of cool shit. We have better, more affordable conferences than *anybody*. Other communities are catching up as far as module repositories and install tools, but they can’t match stuff like CPAN Testers.
shit. Use social media like Twitter, or blogs. Don’t lead with Perl, lead with cool shit. Once you have them hooked on the cool shit, then reveal the Perl if you must.
clip from “SLC Punk” that makes the same point. (Used without permission under the Fair Use provision -- if you’re looking at the PDF version, the clip is at http://www.youtube.com/watch? feature=player_detailpage&v=_nwGndfR4l4#t=113s)
the comments.” Really, that’s a sort of a lie, because we all do it, and we’re all going to continue doing it. It’s a natural thing. Just do it behind a locked door, wash your hands afterwards, and understand that we don’t talk about it.
users group, or Ruby, or Scala, or Clojure... • Start an “Oddball Languages” group • Visit your local hackerspace • Mentor a high school student, or a DIYer Go outside. Here are just a few things to consider doing.
the best ways to save Perl -- or at least the Perl community -- is for everybody in the Perl community to start making a strong and concerted effort to turn outwards, towards all the other communities.
my favorite bands. If you ever get a chance to go to one of their shows, I highly recommend it, it’s the closest thing to a truly ecstatic experience I’ve ever had. Their frontman, Craig Finn, closes all their shows with a little speech that I’m going to steal, because I think it fits the Perl community well.
goes something like this: “We’ve come to the point in the evening where I only have one thing left to say. And I’m not going to pretend that I haven’t said it before, but it could not be more true. There is so much JOY in what we do...”
to OPW (or looking at these slides on the web), thanks to Perigrin for putting together another great OPW. Hope to see you all next year. Share the joy.