I use Perl every day in product/home and have contributed numerous modules on CPAN. The "Ratings" argument is very very thin. Yes, CPAN does have a ratings system ; nobody uses it. Even very very popular and well-written modules, for example Data::Dumper, have below 10 ratings.
There is a new release candidate for CPAN that sets up some very nice defaults for using CPAN:<p><a href="http://www.dagolden.com/index.php/1339/cpan-pm-release-candidate/" rel="nofollow">http://www.dagolden.com/index.php/1339/cpan-pm-release-candi...</a>