in reply to Best of the Best Users in Perlmonks site
I'm surprised to see my name at the top of any such list. Honestly, it makes me a little uneasy; I've done so little compared to others here. The fact that I would appear toward the top of an XP progress list shows that you shouldn't make too much about the numbers. It reminds me of the old saying that has been attributed to, among others, Mark Twain:
There are three types of lies - Lies, damn lies, and stastics.
Mark Twain might even feel uneasy seeing that credited to him; apparently there is some confusion as to who said it first.1
Anyway, as I was saying... I don't really think I've given as much as I've received from the Monastery. It all just goes to show that XP doesn't really represent anything important, and depending on how you analyze and compare "MonkStats", you can tell many different stories.
Frankly, I feel that I've gotten more out of most of my posts than the sum total of all those who have read them; the questions posted here inspired me to dig into the documents and figure things out for myself. I hope that along the way a few others have learned something too, but more importantly, I hope that the aggregate of all answers provided by all individuals at PerlMonks inspires other people to look at new approaches, and to continue asking inspring questions so that others here -- and to a small degree, I -- can continue pushing forward the collective learning curve.
Dave
1. According to this blog, the quote, "There are three types of lies - lies, damn lies, and statistics." has been attributed to Benjamin Disraeli, Alfred Marshall, Mark Twain and "many other dead people."