Python was indeed the scripting replacement. I would say it won because of its philosophy on simplicity and explicitness. Perl v5 suffered heavily in complex projects because the language itself was too complex and often cryptic
PHP kicked Perl's butt in the shared web-hosting environment.
You could do amazing stuff with mod_perl, but it was not possible to run a shared host with mod_perl without exposing every customer to every other customer's code. You could still do cool stuff with vanilla CGIs. Perl was practically synonymous with CGI back in the day. Once you grew past what a simple CGI would handle, it suddenly got a lot harder and a lot more expensive.
Meanwhile, PHP had simple Perl-like syntax and ran nicely in shared hosting. Better yet, you didn't have to choose from one of the 400 different Perl templating systems. No need to choose between TemplateToolkit, HTML::Mason, or Embperl. You just used the standard, built in templating.
PHP won because it was worse, you didn't have the power or choice Perl provided, but it was more than good enough and it was cheaper to grow with.
On Perl vs Python: - Perl was weird and proud of it, it promised creative power and flexibility - Python promised regularity and clear rules
- Perl tried to make hard things easy - Python tried to make routine things routine
- Perl had weird primitives that let you build whatever magical OO nonsense you wanted. - Python supported writing glorified struct OO that was fashionable at the time
- Perl was difficult to integrate with C libraries - Pyton integrated much more easily with C libraries
That being said, I like Perl much more than Python. Using Perl still feels magical, even if some of the syntax is odd. Using Python feels like I have my shoes on the wrong feet.