Stephen Downes

Ongoing coverage from the Blackboard case (see also Seb Schmoller's list). Blackboard has filed - under seal, so nobody can read it - a request for an injunction to stop Desire2Learn from doing business in the United States. D2L posted most of its response online (coverage from Barry Dahl. Michael Feldstein links to this and also Alfred Essa's assessment of how broad the patent is).

D2L's John Baker, meanwhile, has been making himself available for interviews. Speaking with Barry Dahl, he looks beyond the lawsuit. "Once we get past this issue with Blackboard, I think we're going to be in great shape because we're finally going to get an answer about does our work-around get around the patent or not, and as soon as we have that we're free and clear."

Alfred Essa, meanwhile, points to another bogus educational software patent - "a patent lawsuit against 5 for-profit educational companies: University of Phoenix, Inc, The Apollo Group, Inc., Capella Education Company, Laureate Education, Inc., and Walden University, Inc. The patent was filed guess where? Texas Eastern District Court. The patent at issue is called: 'Computer architecture for managing courseware in a shared use operating environment.'"