Making Perl more accessible
There is a reason large software companies provide free or relatively cheap license for their super-expensive software to students.
When these people finish school and look for a job, they will already know how to use that super-expensive software and not the other one.
So when a company hires them, either they let the person use this super-expensive program they need to train the person to use the other one. Even if the other one is free of charge, the training cost and the time it takes to get up-to-speed in that other tool will mean that most companies will opt for the software that has a larger pool of knowledgeable users.
With programming languages there is a similar effect.