Well, it's good that Blackboard is feeling defensive about this. For
sure, they've created "quite a bit of confusion", not to say outrage.
If they do wish to work cooperatively within the e-learning community,
they should now at least specify which of the leading platforms here
they don't regard as breaching this patent (from their vice-president in
the Chronicle article: "This is not a patent that covers all of
e-learning," Mr. Small said. "It doesn't cover all course-management
systems.")
-----Original Message-----
From: Virtual Learning Environments [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Philip Butler
Sent: 11 August 2006 15:06
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [VLES] FW: [CHAMPIONS] Blackboard have Patented the concept of
'Learning Management Systems'
Latest update on the Bb patent from my colleague Rob Englebright - sorry
for any x-posting:
I asked Anthony Doyle the BB UK account manager about this and he was
unwilling to comment but pased on a nice letter from BB high command..
thought you might like to have a read, more stuff on the
http://www.blackboard.com/patent site :
From: Michael Chasen
To: Bb & WebCT Listserves
Re: Blackboard Patent
Dear Client Community:
During the past week, I have had a chance to speak with some of you
individually about Blackboard's patent and the current legal action
against Desire2Learn, Inc. I wanted to take a moment to reach out to all
of you and share some more details on this very important topic.
From recent discussions and posts on various listservs, it seems there
is quite a bit of confusion about the scope of the patent and our
intentions behind the legal action. I hope that the information I am
about to share will help to clear up some of this confusion.
I'd like to start by providing background on the history around our
patent.
After the release of our first products, we looked at the course
management system (CMS) technology available at the time and identified
improvements that would enable the CMS to function as a true enterprise
application for educational institutions. We focused our resources on
developing solutions with the student-centric functionality which would
allow the Blackboard CMS to serve the increasingly complex needs of our
clients. Though we were still in our early stages as a small player in
the software industry, we recognized the importance of protecting our
innovations in our products. As a result, seven years ago, we filed for
patent protection on these developments in various countries around the
world.
Some of the outside commentary about the patent misrepresents the scope
of the patent and appears to be creating confusion for many people. The
Blackboard CMS patent covers only specific features and functionality
contained in the Blackboard system that were developed by the Blackboard
team. We certainly did not invent e-learning or course management
systems, and I am personally embarrassed that this is what some people
thought Blackboard was claiming. Over the last decade and longer,
fantastic advancements have been made throughout the e-learning industry
by a diverse and passionate community of individuals and institutions
and Blackboard is
privileged to have been a contributor.
We are asking Desire2Learn for a reasonable royalty for their use of our
intellectual property, which is in line and consistent with industry
practices. Blackboard, for one, pays royalties to numerous companies
and we are asking for Desire2Learn to do the same in return. We hope
that you will come to see that our patent and law suit are not a
dramatic change for the industry, but a fair course for us to protect
our investments in our technology and your investment in Blackboard.
Our aim is to build an organization that will endure and be there to
support you as your needs evolve.
Having invested well over $100 million in developing our products (and
being one of the few companies who have committed such investment to the
development of technologies for educators), we embrace the
responsibility we have to continue to deliver the innovations you need
to fulfill your institution's mission. Since Blackboard was founded, our
primary goal has been to enhance teaching and learning worldwide through
hard work, investment and innovation. We neither intend to depart from
that tradition nor limit the wonderful work being done outside of
Blackboard to extend our products throughout our growing community of
practice.
To provide you with further information on our patent and the law suit,
we have posted a press release and FAQ about our patent, as well as a
recent article from The Chronicle of Higher Education on our website at
www.blackboard.com/patent.
Should you have any questions regarding the above, I welcome you to
contact your Blackboard representative. Thank you very much.
Sincerely,
Michael Chasen
President and CEO
Blackboard Inc
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