Given all the news and discussion surrounding Blackboard’s strategy change last week, I thought that it would be useful to collect the public statements from Blackboard and their competitors in one place. No analysis, no interviews, just statements. I have a feeling that this might provide a rich source of analysis 6 – 12 months from now.
Blackboard Official Announcements
On March 26th, Blackboard made four simultaneous announcements through press release. They also released two additional press releases based on these four announcements.
- Press Release 3/26 “Blackboard Announces Continued Support for ANGEL” – Blackboard canceled their end-of-life for the ANGEL LMS product, keeping it available indefinitely.
- Press Release 3/26 “Blackboard Appoints Sakai Foundation Board Member Charles Severance to Lead Company’s Sakai Initiatives”– Blackboard hired Charles Severance (Dr. Chuck) to lead this new group, and he laid out much of the rationale in his blog .
- Press Release 3/26 “Blackboard Acquires Moodlerooms, NetSpot” – Blackboard acquired two Moodle hosting and service providers – Moodlerooms in the US and NetSpot in Australia.
- Press Release 3/26 “Blackboard Launches Open Source Services Group” – Blackboard created an Open Source Services Group, which includes helping “institutions successfully manage open source learning management systems (LMS) including Moodle and Sakai”.
- Press Release 3/26 “Statement of Principles” – Key Blackboard executives and hires make a statement regarding their intentions on open source.
- Press Release 3/26 “An Open Letter to the Education Community” – Blackboard sends an open letter summarizing the changes, stating that “Blackboard is becoming a multiple learning platform company that supports both commercially developed software as well as open source solutions.”
Blackboard / Moodlerooms / NetSpot / Moodle / Severance Key Blogs and Interviews
Subsequently, several of the key players in the Blackboard announcements made statements through their own blogs or through media interviews. (more…)