This is an excerpt from the latest version perlfaq1.pod, which
comes with the standard Perl distribution. These postings aim to
reduce the number of repeated questions as well as allow the community
to review and update the answers. The latest version of the complete
perlfaq is at
http://faq.perl.org .
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1.2: Who supports Perl? Who develops it? Why is it free?
The original culture of the pre-populist Internet and the deeply-held
beliefs of Perl's author, Larry Wall, gave rise to the free and open
distribution policy of perl. Perl is supported by its users. The core,
the standard Perl library, the optional modules, and the documentation
you're reading now were all written by volunteers. See the personal note
at the end of the README file in the perl source distribution for more
details. See perlhist (new as of 5.005) for Perl's milestone releases.