As you might imagine, Blackboard and Desire2Learn have somewhat different interpretations of what the recent USPTO ruling means in the bigger picture. And there certainly is plenty of room for interpretation, given the complexity of the situation. There are now no less than three separate, parallel, but not entirely unrelated fronts in the legal war between Blackboard and Desire2Learn. There are many possible permutations of outcomes based on how each is resolved and in which order.
Fasten your seatbelts, folks. This is getting even more complicated. I have spoken with a few experts over the past week to get some perspective. None of them wanted to be quoted on the record, and most preferred to remain anonymous. (I can at least acknowledge and thank Peter Zura for being very generous with his time and providing me with some great background information on patent law.) What follows here is my own, non-lawyer’s interpretation of the sometimes conflicting input I got from these experts. I don’t promise that I’ve gotten every nuance right here, but I’ll do my best to lay out the basics.