Slashdot Log In
All 44 Blackboard Patent Claims Invalidated
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Sat Mar 29, 2008 02:28 AM
from the small-victories-still-victories dept.
from the small-victories-still-victories dept.
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "The US Patent & Trademark Office has invalidated all 44 claims in Blackboard's patent. While this is a non-final action [PDF], which means that Blackboard will be able to appeal, it does represent a win for the Software Freedom Law Center which had requested the reexamination of Blackboard's patent. It is not yet known how this will affect the $3.1M judgment Blackboard won from Desire2Learn."
Related Stories
[+]
Blackboard Wins Patent Suit Against Desire2Learn 186 comments
edremy writes "Blackboard, the dominant learning management system (LMS) maker, has won its initial suit against Desire2Learn. Blackboard gets $3.1 million and can demand that Desire2Learn stop US sales. (We discussed Blackboard when the patent was issued in 2006) This blog provides background on the suit. Blackboard has been granted a patent that covers a single person having multiple roles in an LMS: for example, a TA might be a student in one class and an instructor in another. You wouldn't think something this obvious could even be patented, but so far it's been a very effective weapon for Blackboard, badly hurting Desire2Learn and generating a huge amount of worry for the few remaining commercial LMSs that Blackboard has not already bought, and open source solutions such as Moodle (Blackboard's pledge not to attack such providers notwithstanding)."
Submission: All 44 Blackboard Patent Claims Invalidated by Anonymous Coward
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Full
Abbreviated
Hidden
Loading... please wait.
Get rid of the USPTO (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Get rid of the USPTO (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Strangely they don't do the same for tea.
I would think the Mcdonalds court case will have prevented many accidents due to the change in working practice by Mcdonalds. That is the value in that law suit, not the eventual cash award.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
It's a time honored tradition, [wikipedia.org] you HEATHEN! :-)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Don't get me wrong, I do believe there are huge problems with the patent system and things need to change (and from the article itself, it looks like a small improvement at least is afoot), but you're statement is the equivalent of saying to a kid "Oh, you missed 1 problem out of 2000 on your test. You obviously don't know math an
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Get rid of the USPTO (Score:5, Insightful)
Do they do such a bad job because they receive so many, or do they receive so many becaue they do a bad job?
Parent
Re:Get rid of the USPTO (Score:5, Interesting)
700,000 / 52 = about 13.5K per week.
Give that they have 5,477 patent examiners, that is a rate of about 2.5 patents per examiner per week.
There seems to be, based off of
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The difference being the penalties for failure. If a patent examiner "screws up", he just made the USPTO more money in the form of maintenance fees (the fact that entire swaths of technology are illegitimately locked down is irrelevant.)
If a pharmacist screws up
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Get rid of the USPTO (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re:That's a joke, right? (Score:4, Informative)
When your doctor prescribes something for you, go talk to your pharmacist about your entire drug picture before you start swallowing those little pills. That can very well save your life, particularly if you have something like a heart condition.
Parent
"Prior art" isn't the only problem... (Score:5, Insightful)
Then again, they're getting paid to approve patents, not to reject them so should we be surprised?
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, if the law uses a normal word, maybe you people in the patent industry ought to interpret the law the way it is written.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
And these ideas are then actually utilized by using them in products in the world, I'm sure? Oh wait, they aren't, because they're now patented. The real way ideas are shared is to actually use and share them alongside their products, products which will be much more common when there are no restrictions. If patents didn't exist, no one would feel threatened that they might violate a pat
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Is there class that USES this software? (Score:2)
I've never had a class that actually used the system. At best, they would put a syllabus on the website. MAYBE they would even put a grade or two. And the classes that I had that put grades up, it would be like the first homework grade and nothing else.
For all the money schools put into buying and maintaining these systems, it seems like it's not for any purpose.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
My uni *loves* to use Blackboard and by use I mean the syllabus and occasional grades. It doesn't even do that simple job very well either... certainly nothing that merits anything other than HTML + javascript at most. What do they use? JAVA. yes JAVA of
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
By the look of my Uni's website, it hasn't been updated since 2003. I don't know if there are security issues with this, or perhaps it's just that the copyright notice hasn't been updated with version updates.
In any case, my Uni uses it for classes. Lecturers upload all their lecture slides, tutorial questions, etc. onto the course's Blackboard section, our grades are given on Blackboard, staff make announcements for their course, th
The Mother of all Prior Art ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Quote [thinkofit.com]: "PLATO originated in the early 1960's at the Urbana campus of the University of Illinois. Professor Don Bitzer became interested in using computers for teaching, and with some colleagues founded the Computer-based Education Research Laboratory (CERL). Bitzer, an electrical engineer, collaborated with a few other engineers to design the PLATO hardware. To write the software, he collected a staff of creative eccentrics ranging from university professors to high school students, few of whom had any computer background. Together they built a system that was at least a decade ahead of its time in many ways." (emphasis mine)
Please note that they had a place for "eccentrics" back then.
CC.
What About Learning in Motion's Knowledge Forum? (Score:2)
I think I first learned about Knowledge Forum from Andy at a party we attended in 1997, but I think it was already by then a mature product.
(While Knowle
Re: (Score:2)
Is the tide turning? (Score:5, Interesting)
I found these remarks in the comments of TFA very interesting, and I assume they are genuine.
And this commentator is not alone. I hear from many people who once defended software patents, even those who own them and have profited, that secretly or even openly they believe they are immoral and wrong. The problem has always been that since they were allowed it's been a defensive measure to acquire them.
We have to go back to the source and overturn this awful mistake that was made. The world does not accept software and business patents. Proponents of it can shout and scream all they like, and maybe many will lose a lot of money they wasted on these things, but at the end of the day humanity will be better once we lay this monster to rest. I hope this is the start of a domino effect that starts to bring down all the bogus patents made in bad faith. Only those on real manufacturable goods should stand.
The "legislative intent" that never was... (Score:2, Informative)
The court's logic was based on flawed logic even back then:
As has now been unearthed [oxfordjournals.org], they didn't properly check their sources, misquoting a Senate (by taking too few words, out of context, as their famous citation) which had actually said:
There is hope (Score:2)
I just wonder (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Risk to USERS of open source from patent claims? (Score:5, Insightful)
1) Any patent lawsuit against a user of a software component used by major vendors will automatically result in those vendors lending legal support to reduce the chance that their own customers will also end up being sued.
2) Any patent lawsuit costs the suing party at least several hundred thousand dollars.
3) Any patent put before the courts is at very great risk of being destroyed by prior art.
4) Any payout awarded from a single end user has to be in proportion to value of the patented technology. The value of a single instance will could only be measured in hundreds of dollars, not coming close to covering the costs of the lawsuit to the platiff.
5) Patent lawsuits take six years to over a decade to work it's way though appeals.
6) Developers will release new software using a method that circumvents the patent in question within two months. This will be quickly adopted and by the time the first patent case is resolved there will be no further customers for the patent holder to sue.
7) The outrage generated in taking out a case against any open source will result in Groklaw [groklaw.net] and other groups putting the suing party and their lawyers under the closest scrutiny. You will not believe the level of bad publicity, let alone the the amount of prior art, dirty business practices, and legal suspect practices and even violation of statutes [rcn.com] that will be uncovered.
Lastly to quote Pulp Fiction, and then "we are going to get medieval on your ass."
Any IP case against users of open source puts the attacker at a far greater risk.
Re:Risk to USERS of open source from patent claims (Score:2)
4) Any payout awarded from a single end user has to be in proportion to value of the patented technology. The value of a single instance will could only be measured in hundreds of dollars, not coming close to covering the costs of the lawsuit to the platiff.
Tell that to RIM.
Where to Send Your Check (Score:5, Informative)
Software Freedom Law Center
1995 Broadway, 17th floor
New York, NY 10023
They're a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, so if you're in the US, your contribution will be tax-deductible.
It's expensive to fight lawsuits. Vote with your wallet!
So... (Score:2)
Blackboard was hated before the patent issue (Score:3, Informative)
A number of small and medium sized schools are going to Moodle and customizing it for their environment (for example, incorporating home-grown services into it, etc). Moodle's been growing by leaps and bounds the last year or two, and I expect it's going to keep growing. Sakai's harder to implement, unless you have a herd of Java developers at your disposal. Faculty always want significant local customization.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Gradebook is a NIGHTMARE. I mistyped one of the calcs (23 instead 32 percent) and didn't catch it u
From a local newspaper (Score:2)
They were devastated by the earlier court ruling, and now this?
Here is an article [therecord.com] from the local newspaper on the topic.
Note: RIM is also local here, and NTP's affair with them was closely followed.
Time to revamp how patents are issued, or have the USPTO pay the court damages due to wrongly issued patents.
Re:Hopefully this means my school will drop softwa (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Hopefully this means my school will drop softwa (Score:4, Interesting)
1. No Friefox support. It's annoying that I have to actually use IE or something just to access one site.
2. This isn't a problem with Blackboard in an of itself, per se, but because teachers can post assignments there, they often feel the need to not mention homework at all and just expect us to check it nightly. For every class. This is sheer laziness. I'm a full time college student and I also have a part time job almost every night after classes as well as on most weekends. I don't have the time, motivation, or energy to double check for possible assignments every night. And it takes all of 10 seconds to tell a class of an assignment or to at least look for it as they LEAVE class.
3. It's slow and bloated, as mentioned above. Add reason 2 to this and it's an unnecessary waste of time.
Parent
Re:Hopefully this means my school will drop softwa (Score:2, Informative)
NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!
When students started buying computers with Vista, Blackboard would not play right with them. They had all kinds of issues. It won't even play right with Internet Explorer at our school. I'm just glad I'm not the Blackboard admin.
Note to my college administration:
Ever wonder why the University of Phoenix is so expensive? It's becaus
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
If they don't win an appeal, their patent could turn to dust. They'd better do their lines and improve their software, or a chunk of their business could be erased from competing products.