Talk:Blackboard Inc.

Untitled

Advertising. This whole page reads like it was copied from the company's "About:" page. User:Zoe|^(talk) 22:42, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

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Questionable Edit. I had put the following paragraph at the close of the article to counter the advert tone of the article, only to have it removed by a new user with no explanation. I would rather get a discussion of why this was removed than do an automatic revert - what do people think? And, with the paragraph below, could we remove the advert tag? User:Dialectric June 20, 2006 quote: - Moodle and the Sakai Project are open source alternatives to the Blackboard Academic Suite. These projects grew out of a need for a low cost, high flexibility course and content management software, and are supported by universities and system administrators who see the high cost of purchasing and administrating Blackboard products, and the closed source nature of those products, as significant drawbacks.

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Desire2Learn lawsuit. Cleaned up this text. Added and fixed details. Added info on the Moodle organization's efforts to publicize the lawsuit. Reorganized the page - seems to look cleaner now. Cheers. --dilettante 23:00, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

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--141.156.144.132 23:58, 17 August 2006 (UTC): Bb/Scholar360 Comparison. Removed the Bb-Scholar360 comparison link in External Links section. This comparison was marketing material created and hosted by Scholar360, not by a neutral third party.

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The article currently states "Blackboard Collaborate launched in July 2010.". More research needed, but I think it's more accurate to say "Blackboard announced an acquisition of Elluminate in July of 2010. Their flagship product, Elluminate Live!, then became the foundation for Blackboard Collaborate". (e.g. http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2010/07/05/daily39.html)dwarring 29 August 2012

cupcake lawsuit

Was it a lawsuit or just a complaint? --Gbleem 03:43, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Blackboard patent analyzed

Here is my layman analysis of the Blackboard patent. Patent here: [[1]] The key to this patent is two-fold: first, a MEANS to ASSIGN a level of ACCESS to EACH data file based on the user's role (i.e., student or teacher); second, this means to determine whether access is warranted, and to control the data file. To break this patent, that is, to work around it (avoid infringement), you simply have to design a system that does not ASSIGN to EACH data file a level of ACCESS, nor determine whether access is warranted. How to do this? Easy. You simply allow each student and teacher to access a shared DIRECTORY (folder) rather than a file. Another workaround, since the patent covers server-client networks, is to have a "peer-to-peer" network, like gnutella or edonkey. Finally, you can simply fight the patent in court (which one company is doing). Now this workaround only avoids direct infringment--the patent holder can argue of indirect infringement as well. Also, it may not be technically possible to implement this workaround. For this reason, it might make more sense to try and invalidate the patent in court. Language from the patent here: "means for assigning a level of access to and control of each data file based on a user of the system's predetermined role in a course; means for determining whether access to a data file associated with the course is authorized; means for allowing access to and control of the data file associated with the course if authorization is granted based on the access level of the user of the system.

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partisan politics

The link alleging close ties between Federated and the Republican party appears to go to a strongly partisan web site. To maintain NPOV, it would be better to justify the claim that "some of the Donahues are among the biggest individual donors to the Republican National Committee and to the Bush family" with a link to a better source, such as the Federal Election Commission.

Update: I went back and added POV-check-section to this section. It seems like there are a lot of unsourced/questionably-sourced, and perhaps non-NPOV compliant statments in there.

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--141.156.144.132 12:34, 17 August 2006 (UTC): Oh man, this "Blackboard's ownership" section is conspiracy theory at its best. It's drawn word for word from this blog post.

The blog is written by George Roberts aka Wikipedia user, User:Peaceful, who added the "Blackboard's ownership" section to the Wikipedia entry.

When you google around, it's pretty clear that Roberts is spinning an undocumented conspiracy theory. Examples:

His comments on this blog post: "Blackboard’s major shareholders include Federated Investors, the Carlyle Group and Oak Hill Capital Partners. These firms are very close to the Whitehouse and are among the biggest corporate and individual donors to the Republican Party and the Bush family. Although I usually Favour cock-up to conspiracy, the Bb patent skirmish is, maybe, an important little battle in the hearts-and-minds war."

This post from his blog: "With Federated, Carlyle and Oak Hill all in the Bb shareholders club along with Bill Gates, Microsoft and Pearson, Blackboard might be seen as a bit of a darling. So, the question becomes why on two fronts: why Bb, and why the patent and litigation route? Is it that Bb's behavior (or the behavior of the company's principals) makes it attractive to big-time buccaneering neocons, or is the company being gently encouraged in this direction by its owners? And/or is there another angle to be explored? One to do with shaping the tools and, because of the nature of the VLE/LMS toolkit, shaping the institutions that shape the minds that make the world what it is?"

Another one from Roberts: "Blackboard provides a means towards control of the curriculum should someone want to. The patent application was, possibly, late dot-com chutzpah. Its subsequent deployment strikes me as strategic and in line with neoconservative affinities. In fact, the patent pending status must have been one of the reasons Microsoft and the venture capitalists backed Bb in the first place. Should the patent not have been granted they could have quietly sold up."

None of these assertions are documented. This is not the kind of stuff that belongs in Wikipedia.

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" This is not the kind of stuff that belongs in Wikipedia."

I have to agree. To be credible, the author would need to demonstrate that a) Blackboard has significantly more institutional investors than similar publicly held coporations (possible, but unlikely) and b) that those institutional investors were significantly more "Republican" than the norm for such groups (seems implausible; investment bankers, venture capitalists, and the like tend to be rather Republican as a general rule).

Otherwise, it does look like partisan conspiracy mongering. I don't see Microsoft investing in Blackboard as particularly noteworthy; they have their fingers in a lot of pies (e.g., Microsoft has also donated money to Moodle, a GPL course management system). Unless this section can be justified with links to credible sources, it should be deleted.

It's sad that there is a certain demographic that seems compelled to climb on their favorite political hobbyhorse, regardless of the nominal subject under discussion. Not everything involves a Bush conspiracy, just as not everything involved a Clinton conspiracy back in his day. I find partisan screeching of any stripe less than useful. Keep it on your blog, not in Wikipedia.

BTW, I'm not a Republican (or a Democrat), and I think Blackboard's recent actions are morally repugnant and will, in the long term, prove to be a financial disaster for the company. What were they thinking?

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I see someone cleaned this up and got rid of most of the over-the-top stuff, but I still question whether it's noteworthy at all. Firms like Morgan Stanley invest in thousands of different publicly held corporations (they hold positions in 4,566 different companies as I type; their $44 million investment in Blackboard doesn't show up until you get to the 34th screen of the list, so it's very small by their standards).

Also, any list of this nature is practically guaranteed to be outdated almost before it's entered. Unless someone can provide a clear reason why institutional holdings in Blackboard are of particular interest, this entire section should be deleted.

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The investments by Microsoft and Pearson Publishing are significant. Blackboard has a well-documented history of collaboration with Microsoft, which to a large extent makes them representative of Microsoft's presence in e-learning. Additionally, Blackboard has documented agreements with publishers and is a means of marketing commercial product to clients.

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I work in the field of educational technology at a univeristy. Not to support conspiracy theories, but there the discussion about 'who owns the content' isn't just about culling learning materials for free. There is a legitimate fear from professors of being blacklisted for having liberal views. Perhaps that is connected to what you are discussing. This blog tells the story and it would be easy to dig up legitimate news sources. I remember reading about these instances as they happened. http://www.theinquirer.net/images/articles/blackboard.pdf

IF Bb is involved in such a scheme, that will be the end of their business. Campus are running from Bb due to high prices and this patent crap. I was a local hero for migrating my univeristy off Bb. Computerhag 14:45, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

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138.88.67.103 20:30, 2 September 2006 (UTC) Removed the Blackboard Ownership section. It was flagged weeks ago and no one has stood up and said that it should stay. The closest was the guy who said the investments by Microsoft and Pearson are significant.

The intent of the person who originally posted this section was conspiracy-mongering, i.e. trying to imply that the Blackboard patent controversy represents some kind of attempt by Republican/conservative to "shape the minds" of children by . . . what? By investing in a company and then somehow forcing the company to be successful and then strongarming the company into filing a patent that takes six years to be granted so that they can then . . . what? Blackboard *still* doesn't determine the content of the university courses that are delivered on its software. Does this George Roberts guy think that Bb has subliminal messages embedded in their logo or something?!? It's really just preposterous.

I looked at a dozen or so other Wikipedia articles on public companies and didn't see any that listed out the company's major investors. There doesn't seem to be any merit or purpose to having this section in the article.

Blackboard patent

I think this article should be here --69.250.70.141 03:15, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

NPOV?

Does anyone have any objection to removing the neutrality flag? The article seems neutral to me - dialectric

Questionable Edit. I had put the following paragraph at the close of the article to counter the advert tone of the article, only to have it removed by a new user with no explanation. I would rather get a discussion of why this was removed than do an automatic revert - what do people think? And, with the paragraph below, could we remove the advert tag? User:Dialectric June 20, 2006

Where???

Forum Shopping. I'm really surprised this article doesn't mention forum shopping, or am I the only one who initially thought that Lufkin, Texas was an odd venue for Blackboard to pursue its patent lawsuit? It took a couple of minutes before I remembered something about east Texas being a very, uh, "popular" place for pursuing these kinds of suits. Unless someone can suggest a different and credible reason why Lufkin would be chosen, I think this article deserves a mention of the topic. Anon July 3, 2007.

Why all the legal stuff?

Why is this article so absorbed in the litigation stuff? It seems really unbalanced, given how little actual information about Blackboard's products is provided. Back to Google, I guess.

Product information does not belong in Wiki unless it is truely notable. Legal stuff appears to be the main reason why the company is significant -- as its impact on clients, other companies, and the US patent system for software patents is noteworthy. Bw022 (talk) 20:34, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Well - looking at Slashdot and TechDirt today I see a long article calling BlackBoard Inc a "patent troll" - comparable to SCO. We look at SCO's article and we see a major legal issues section too - and the community appears to have accepted the content on the former. -- Tawker (talk) 15:09, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Blackboard is not SCO. The fact that the two have similiar noteable legal issues does not mean that they have similiarly noteable products. SCO had considerably more than 2200 installations. I fail to see how they are noteable. Bw022 (talk) 00:13, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Could we at least have it written in real paragraphs instead of this retarded bullet-outline format? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.167.45.203 (talk) 03:42, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Coursesites ? What is it?

Coursesites is a service being advertised by Bb . . . does anyone know any more about it? How does Bb make $$ from it? What about the intellectual property issues so very much ballyhooed throughout the discussion pages? Really. Could someone please put some info up on WPedia about it?

1. 1. 1. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.90.178.244 (talk) 07:43, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Coursesites is their free demo of the learning management system "Learn". According to the terms of use, the usage is free limited access for non-profit users. Profit usage is only allowed for customers having licened a Blackboard product for the purpose to trial and develop. Coursesite preview capability is important for the majority of users running the old interface now called "Original Experience". Coursites allows to testdrive Learn with the new "Ultra experience" user interface . --Telcoach (talk) 10:12, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

Working to improve this article

No question, this article requires a lot of work before it conforms to Wikipedia's guidelines, and I plan to do just that. I rolled back a spot of vandalism to the article recently and have just added it to a handful of relevant WikiProjects, but before I go any further I should disclose that I have a financial relationship with Blackboard Inc. Ever mindful of abiding by Wikpedia's conflict of interest provisos, I'll make sure all direct edits to the live article are non-controversial, and I'll first seek consensus in proposing more substantive changes. If you see this note and are interested in helping to improve the page, please join in. Cheers, WWB Too (talk) 18:52, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

I've gone ahead updated the logo, updated the infobox with current figures, added Mobile to the list of products and included some third-party references for information already contained. That said, the article is still a mess: the introduction is too short, the History section is under-developed, the Products section is in need of prosification, and the legal issues section especially should be considered very carefully. It's my goal to come up with some better alternatives for each. Might take me awhile, but I'll see what I can do. WWB Too (talk) 19:42, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Proposed rewrite

It's been a while since I posted here to say that I'd be working on improving this article, but in that time I've put together a completely new draft as an intended replacement for the current article. My draft addresses all of the problems with the current version, particularly with regard to missing or outdated information, weak structure of sections and over-reliance on lists.

In the proposed draft, I have:

• Extended the introduction to provide a better summary of the article, with key information about Blackboard.
• Rewritten the History section to include more information about the history of the company following its foundation. In particular, I've added details about the company's growth and its acquisitions. At the moment, the History section does not cover the full history of the company and, in particular, skips over the development and growth of Blackboard from 2004 to 2011.
• Added an "Operations" section to provide an overview of the company's structure, business model, key employees and financial results. Currently there is next to nothing about this included.
• Renamed and rewrote the "Products" section to include Blackboard's services. This section is named "Products and services" in my draft, and includes subsections to describe the product platforms and a subsection summarizing the details of Blackboard's service offerings. In the current article this section is a bulleted list of products, and does not provide a full summarized explanation of the products offered. It also does not mention the services that Blackboard provides. Note also that I've endeavored to keep this encyclopedic, and not an advertisment for the company's products and services, following Wikipedia:Companies, corporations and economic information fom WikiProject Companies.
• Added a section named "Development of education software", which outlines Blackboard's involvement in the development and growth of the use of education software.
• The final major section is a renamed "Legal matters" section, dealing with the events following the award of U.S. Patent 6,988,138 to Blackboard. Since the current section is a blow-by-blow of events in a bullet list, which is not the preferred format for information such as this, I have rewritten the section as prose. The section has been summarized to include only the most important events, and I have removed the information about Cupcake Patrol and the security research, as neither of these were particularly major events and did not have a significant effect upon the company. This is likely to be the most contentious section, and I am happy to discuss it in specifics.
• In the "See also" section I have added a couple of new links to related articles that are not linked in the draft.

As much as possible I have used third-party sources to provide reliable sources for information in the article, however in places I've also used Blackboard's website to verify straightforward details, such as dates of acquisitions.

For anyone who may have this page watchlisted, please take a look at this draft and let me know if you have any feedback, or if you think this would be OK to move into place as is. If you think the draft mostly represents an improvement but have some small edits to suggest, I would recommend that the draft be moved into place and then any edits can be made or discussed. If there is no response here, I'll seek feedback on relevant WikiProjects, but if after a week or so there are no serious disagreements, then I'll probably move it.

Note also that in my userspace draft, I have commented out the company's non-free logo and disabled categories as well. These will need to be restored if and when this new draft goes live. Cheers, WWB Too (talk) 15:16, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Just a quick follow-up note: I've asked for input at WikiProjects Companies, Education and Universities, with some constructive discussion so far at Education. WWB Too (talk) 23:03, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

With assent from an editor at WikiProject Education, and no dissent (or any other reply) from the others, I've copied it over. And that editor offered some constructive criticisms, which might be a starting point for anyone interested in improving it further. Cheers, WWB Too (talk) 18:59, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Student Opinion

The whole section has no sources! the last sentence is certainly not encyclopaedia worthy: "Blackboard's near-monopoly in the internet education suite has seemed to slow their innovation in the products, and it shows."...i'm a noob, but should that part at least be removed? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.26.85.6 (talk) 13:35, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

I hate to remove material critical of a product, but I cannot find sources for anything in this section. I will tag it, and see what other editors do. Wikfr (talk) 03:37, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Addressing problems related to tag on current version

A year and a half ago, I worked on a new draft for this article to address problems with the article at the time (you can see the details of this above). Since then, some aspects of the article have become outdated and an editor has expressed concerns that details in the article read as promotional, leading to the addition of the warning tag at the top of the article.

As I disclosed in 2011, I am again working on behalf of Blackboard Inc. and seeking to improve the article, particularly to bring it up-to-date and address the warning tag. I have moved the article into my userspace and made some edits to update the material, address the promotional material per notes from the editor (User:DGG) who added the tag. As that editor is busy and has not been able to get back to this, I'd like to invite other editors to review the article draft in my userspace and see if it addresses the issue flagged by the tag on the article.

The user space draft is here: User:WWB_Too/Blackboard_Inc._(2013_revision)

To summarize the main changes that I've made:

• Removed citations to press releases and material only sourceable to press releases
• Updated infobox to current information
• Removed out-of-date financial information; moved financial information into the History section as appropriate
• Updated the lede to reflect purchase by Providence, latest client information
• Updated Operations with latest personnel information and to reflect that the company is no longer publicly traded
• Added details on the 2011 Edline merger to the History
• Clarified in the lede and Operations that the company is best known for its Blackboard Learning System
• Trimmed promotional-sounding wording

If editors here feel that the version in my userspace is an improvement and addresses the tag on the article, can someone move this version live and remove the tag? (Please note I have disabled the categories and non-free logo in my draft; these will need to be re-enabled if moved over.) I'm open to any further suggestions for improvements or if there are any questions about the draft version I've worked on, please let me know. Cheers, WWB Too (Talk · COI) 13:09, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Much improved. In section 4: "had the major share in the early 2000s.." needs to be expanded into saying what has happened since--even if it is covered elsewhere. There's a lot more to be said, but it can be added at some point. The patent discussion should indicate the key claims, even if it has to be done as a footnote to avoid looking disproportionate. I'd abbreviate the sections on the products a little more--the major one, after all, has its own article. I'd replace 2/3 of the uses of "Blackboard" by either "the firm" or "it". I'd copyedit for redundancies like "originally launched". I would list only the ceo in the infobox. If these are fixed, I'd be willing to move it to mainspace. � DGG ( talk ) 22:23, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

Hi DGG, I've updated the draft again following your feedback. Here are the changes I've made:

• I found more recent sources on Blackboard's share of the learning management system market and have added this information to the end of the Development of education software section.
• I have attempted to better explain Blackboard's patent claims, however The Washington Post source currently in the article explains it simply as follows:

"Blackboard Inc. has been awarded a patent establishing its claims to some of the basic features of the software that powers online education."

and

"Blackboard's patent doesn't refer to any device or even specific software code. Rather, it describes the basic framework of an LMS. In short, Blackboard says what it invented isn't learning tools such as drop boxes but the idea of putting such tools together in one big, scalable system across a university."

You'll also see the patent itself lists many claims, cleary too many to summarize here.

• I've condensed the Products and services section.
• I've copy-edited the draft to remove the over use of "Blackboard" and "launched".
• I've removed the additional key people from the infobox, only the CEO remains.

In addition to the requests you made above, I made a few more minor updates including:

• Changing "enterprise software" to "enterprise technology" in the introduction, which I feel better reflect Blackboards current products as well as other slight copy edits to intro.
• Slight copy edits to History section.
• Adding information about Blackboard Engage to the Products and services section and updating the first sentence of Services to list Blackboard's current services

Let me know if the draft is ready to move live now? Also, I should mention: I have some concerns about the Criticism section which appeared in the article a few days ago (single-edit account, two of three sources non-RS) but I don't want that to slow down our progress here. If you prefer, I'm fine leaving that section for now, but I am looking to revise it soon as I feel that the first two sources fail to meet Wikipedia's standards for reliable sources. Anyhow, more on that later. Let me know if you have any questions about the changes I've made in my draft. Cheers, WWB Too (Talk · COI) 18:51, 14 June 2013 (UTC)

Update following addition of Criticism section

In the current, recently added Criticism section, only one of the sources is a reliable independent source: the TechCrunch article. One source is a website that collates information from social media sites (Amplicate), and the other is blog post on a website focusing on offering tips for college students (HackCollege). I've focused my revision just on the criticism from the TechCrunch article, which offers an opinion on the "feature creep" in Blackboard's learning management software. I've added this into the Blackboard Learn section, since the criticism is about the software. Although the source doesn't specifically mention Blackboard Learn, the criticism is clearly about the company's learning management software. With these changes, I think my full draft (here) now addresses this material properly. Cheers, WWB Too (Talk · COI) 22:09, 17 June 2013 (UTC)

I think it's OK, and I'm moving it to mainspace to replace the current contents. to the best of my own knowledge of the subject, it's a reasonable presentation of the material. DGG ( talk ) 02:56, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

Adding link to new Michael Chasen article

Hi, a few weeks ago I helped to create an article for Blackboard's co-founder and former CEO Michael Chasen. I'm reaching out here to see if anyone would be able to add in a wikilink to this article, linking where Michael Chasen is mentioned in this article to the newly created article. Though I feel like this is an appropriate, neutral edit to make I'll refrain from doing so myself, since I have a COI: my work on the Michael Chasen article was on behalf of his new company, SocialRadar. As with all COI projects I work on, I like to avoid direct edits to live articles. (In the interest of full disclosure, I'd like to note that I work with WWB Too who offered a new version of this article for review recently.)

As Chasen's full name is only used in two locations in this article — once in the introduction and once in the Early history section — I would suggest adding a wikilink to both of these occurrences, though I'm open to other suggestions. Thanks in advance for reviewing this. I'll be keeping an eye on this talk page so please reply here if you have any questions or can help with this small edit. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 00:47, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

The links have been added, so my request is complete. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 21:43, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

Requesting a few updates

Hi folks, I've been asked by Blackboard to request some updates to a few areas of this article, as there have been some changes at Blackboard recently. Because I have a financial COI, I will not be making any direct edits to the article. Instead, I'll propose the updates here on the Talk page so other editors can review them and then implement them if they look okay. I should also note that I am a colleague of editors 16912 Rhiannon and WWB Too, who have posted here previously.

• The first request is for "Blackboard Learning System" in the introductory paragraph to be changed to "Blackboard Learn," which is supported by this source.

• Secondly, I'd like to propose including additional recent events under the Buyout heading of the History section. I've prepared new language to follow information about Blackboard's acquisition of Moodlerooms Inc. and NetSpot.

Addition to Buyout section

Jay Bhatt succeeded Chasen as CEO of the company in October 2012. In January 2014, Blackboard purchased Austin-based online education company MyEdu, which provides education and career planning tools for college students. The acquisition was the first under Bhatt's leadership and was seen as a step toward a new focus on student-based software according to The Washington Post.

References

Markup

Jay Bhatt succeeded Chasen as CEO of the company in October 2012.<ref name=Nagel12>{{cite news |title=Blackboard CEO Chasen To Step Down |last1=Nagel |first1=David |url=http://thejournal.com/articles/2012/10/15/blackboard-ceo-chasen-to-step-down.aspx |newspaper=[[T.H.E. Journal]] |date=15 October 2012 |accessdate=23 January 2014}}</ref> In January 2014, Blackboard purchased Austin-based online education company MyEdu, which provides education and career planning tools for college students. The acquisition was the first under Bhatt's leadership and was seen as a step toward a new focus on student-based software according to ''[[The Washington Post]]''.<ref name=Overly14>{{cite news |title=The Download: Blackboard makes first acquisition under CEO Jay Bhatt |last1=Overly |first1=Steven |url=http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/capitalbusiness/the-download-blackboard-makes-first-acquisition-under-ceo-jay-bhatt/2014/01/16/35e7dc1e-7d5d-11e3-9556-4a4bf7bcbd84_story.html |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |date=16 January 2014 |accessdate=23 January 2014}}</ref>

• Finally, I'd like to request recent leadership changes be reflected in the Operations section of the article. I've revised the entire last sentence of this section below. Please note that the final two SVP's titles can only be verified via the company Leadership page.

New leadership sentence

The company's leadership is comprised of president and CEO Jay Bhatt, CFO Bill Davis, SVP of Product Management Mark Strassman, SVP of Product Development Gary Lang, SVP of International Matt Small, SVP of Marketing Tracey Stout, SVP of Education Services Katie Blot, SVP of K-12 Mark Belles, SVP of Higher Education, Corporate & Government Markets Maurice Heiblum, and SVP of Blackboard Transact David Marr.

References

Markup

The company's leadership is comprised of president and CEO Jay Bhatt, CFO Bill Davis,<ref name=Zhang12>{{cite news |title= Michael Chasen calls D.C. a top tech city |author= Tong Zhang |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/news/2012/11/15/michael-chasen-calls-dc-a-top-tech.html |work=[[American City Business Journals|Washington Business Journal]] |date=15 November 2012 |accessdate=23 January 2014}}</ref> SVP of Product Management Mark Strassman, SVP of Product Development Gary Lang, SVP of International Matt Small, SVP of Marketing Tracey Stout,<ref name=FlookJun13>{{cite news |title=Exclusive: Blackboard brings in Autodesk vets in centralization push |last1=Flook |first1=Bill |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/blog/techflash/2013/06/blackboard-brings-in-autodesk-vets-in.html?page=all |newspaper=[[American City Business Journals|Washington Business Journal]] |date=28 June 2013 |accessdate=23 January 2014}}</ref> SVP of Education Services Katie Blot,<ref name=Kim13>{{cite news |title=7 Questions for Katie Blot, President Blackboard Education Services |author=Joshua Kim |url=http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/technology-and-learning/7-questions-katie-blot-president-blackboard-education-services |work=[[Inside Higher Ed]] |date=16 January 2013 |accessdate=23 January 2014}}</ref> SVP of K-12 Mark Belles,<ref name=CC13>{{cite news |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |title=Nixa Public Schools earns national communication award |url=http://ccheadliner.com/n2christiancounty/nixa-public-schools-earns-national-communication-award/article_a2690d8e-4d49-11e3-80d1-001a4bcf887a.html |newspaper=[[Christian County Headliner]] |date=14 November 2013 |accessdate=23 January 2014 }}</ref> SVP of Higher Education, Corporate & Government Markets Maurice Heiblum, and SVP of Blackboard Transact David Marr.<ref name=Blackboard14>{{cite web |url=https://www.blackboard.com/About-Bb/Who-We-Are/Leadership.aspx |title=Leadership |publisher=[[Blackboard]] |accessdate=6 February 2014}}</ref>

I may be back with some additional update requests later, but I hope an editor can take a look at these in the meantime and, if they look okay, go ahead and implement these changes. Let me know if you have any questions! Cheers, ChrisPond (Talk · COI) 14:51, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

I finished making these changes; I hope that the way that I implemented these is satisfactory.--ɱ (talk) 20:58, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

Looks perfect, thanks so much! ChrisPond (Talk · COI) 22:26, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

I've removed the info about the WP:NN executives. While you have sources, it's not clear that the information there does anything other than promote the executives that have hired you. There's no indication that they've done anything that needs to be noted in an encyclopedia. Sure they have the roles now but this isn't Linkedin. The info about the CEO is presented in other areas of the article. The Dissident Aggressor 16:24, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Updates for introduction and Products and services

Hi to anyone watching this page! Blackboard has made several new acquisitions this year and has undergone significant changes to the company and its products since this article was last updated. To help bring it up-to-date, I've been working on behalf of Blackboard to prepare some edits to this article. Some editors may remember me from a previous message here about adding a wikilink to the Michael Chasen article. This time around, I'm requesting changes to the infobox and introduction, and the addition of a new subsection to the Products and services section. I'm also working on some larger suggestions for the History section that I will share later.

I've revised the introduction to include a few updates. Blackboard's CEO, Jay Bhatt is currently not mentioned at all. What do other editors think about adding the sentence: "The company's CEO is Jay Bhatt, who has led Blackboard since October 2012" following the first sentence? Additionally, the last sentence of the introduction is a bit outdated. I found some more recent stats from 2014 that can added. The slightly reworked introduction is below:

Introduction

Blackboard Inc. is an enterprise technology company with corporate headquarters in Washington, D.C. that is primarily known as a developer of education software, in particular Blackboard Learn, its flagship learning management system. The company's CEO is Jay Bhatt, who has led Blackboard since October 2012. Blackboard provides education, mobile, communication, and commerce software and related services to clients including education providers, corporations and government organizations. The firm has seven platforms called Learn, Transact, Engage, Connect, Mobile, Collaborate and Analytics that are offered in bundled solutions. Blackboard was founded by Michael Chasen, Matthew Pittinsky, Stephen Gilfus and Daniel Cane in 1997, and became a public company in 2004. It operated publicly until Providence Equity Partners purchased the company in 2011. As of January 2014, its software and services are used by over 17,000 schools and organizations in 100 countries. Seventy-five percent of US colleges and universities and more than half of K-12 districts in the United States use its products and services.

References

Markup

Blackboard Inc. is an enterprise technology company with corporate headquarters in Washington, D.C. that is primarily known as a developer of education software, in particular Blackboard Learn, its flagship learning management system.<ref>{{cite news|last=Nagel|first=David|title=Blackboard Learn Expands Open Education Standards Support|url=http://thejournal.com/articles/2011/07/13/blackboard-learn-expands-open-education-standards-support.aspx|accessdate=February 10, 2014|newspaper=THEJournal|date=July 13, 2011}}</ref> The company's CEO is Jay Bhatt, who has led Blackboard since October 2012. Blackboard provides education, mobile, communication, and commerce software and related services to clients including education providers, corporations and government organizations. The firm has seven platforms called Learn, Transact, Engage, Connect, Mobile, Collaborate and Analytics that are offered in bundled solutions. Blackboard was founded by Michael Chasen, Matthew Pittinsky, Stephen Gilfus and Daniel Cane in 1997, and became a public company in 2004. It operated publicly until Providence Equity Partners purchased the company in 2011. As of January 2014, its software and services are used by over 17,000 schools and organizations in 100 countries.<ref name=Empson14>{{cite news |title=Education Giant Blackboard Buys MyEdu To Help Refresh Its Brand And Reanimate Its User Experience |author=Rip Empson |url=http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/16/education-giant-blackboard-buys-myedu-to-help-refresh-its-brand-and-reanimate-its-user-experience/ |work=[[TechCrunch]] |date=16 January 2014 |accessdate=29 May 2014}}</ref> Seventy-five percent of US colleges and universities and more than half of K-12 districts in the United States use its products and services.<ref name=Corcoran14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard's Jay Bhatt Strikes Up the Brass Band |author=Betsy Corcoran |url=https://www.edsurge.com/n/2014-07-23-blackboard-s-jay-bhatt-strikes-up-the-brass-band?elq=29068c31188e4150bde7dd6db8a3dab7&elqCampaignId=7599 |work=[[Edsurge]] |date=23 July 2014 |accessdate=2 September 2014}}</ref>

In July, Blackboard announced that it would be offering its products in scalable packages called "solutions." This is a big shift from its previous model of licensing individual products. I've drafted a short subsection covering the basics of this change to follow the other sections in Products and services. The draft, as well as the markup are below.

Solutions

Solutions

In July 2014, it was announced that Blackboard would begin offering bundles of its individual products as what the company calls solutions. The company created four higher education solutions focused on learning called Learning Core, Learning Essentials, Learning Insight, and Learning Insight & Student Retention. Each of the solutions includes Blackboard Learn. Four additional higher education solutions offer commerce and security options. There are five solutions geared toward K-12 that are related to classroom learning and community engagement.

References

Markup

===Solutions=== In July 2014, it was announced that Blackboard would begin offering bundles of its individual products as what the company calls solutions. The company created four higher education solutions focused on learning called Learning Core, Learning Essentials, Learning Insight, and Learning Insight & Student Retention. Each of the solutions includes Blackboard Learn.<ref name=Feldstein14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard’s Big News that Nobody Noticed |author=Michael Feldstein |url=http://mfeldstein.com/blackboards-big-news-nobody-noticed/ |work=e-Literate |date=18 July 2014 |accessdate=2 September 2014}}</ref> Four additional higher education solutions offer commerce and security options. There are five solutions geared toward K-12 that are related to classroom learning and community engagement.<ref name=Corcoran14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard's Jay Bhatt Strikes Up the Brass Band |author=Betsy Corcoran |url=https://www.edsurge.com/n/2014-07-23-blackboard-s-jay-bhatt-strikes-up-the-brass-band?elq=29068c31188e4150bde7dd6db8a3dab7&elqCampaignId=7599 |work=[[Edsurge]] |date=23 July 2014 |accessdate=2 September 2014}}</ref>

Along with the change to the Products and services section, the infobox "Products" field should also be updated to include these new solutions. The Higher Ed and K-12 solutions are as follows:
Learning Core
Learning Essentials
Learning Insight
Learning Insight & Student Retention
Common Core
Innovative Classroom
Open Learning
Parental Engagement
K-12 Central Mobile App
TipTxt for Anti-bullying

The infobox currently only mentions Jay Bhatt under Key people, but the article mentions several more staff members that could be included. I'd like to suggest the following people be added to this field: Bill Davis (Chief Financial Officer), Mark Strassman (Senior Vice President of Product Management), Gary Lang (Senior Vice President of Product Development), Katie Blot (Senior Vice President of Education Services), Tracey Stout (Senior Vice President of Marketing).

As I have a conflict of interest, I will not make any of these changes myself. Instead, I hope an editor here will review these requests and make the edits if they agree with them. Thanks for taking a look. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 20:21, 27 October 2014 (UTC)

Did most of the things; not the last one. Business articles only list the founder and the current CEO/chairman/president, not all the VPs, CFOs, COOs, CCOs, etc. unless there's some really obvious reason to. Let me know what you think of my edits based on your suggestions.--ɱ (talk) 05:40, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

Hi Ɱ, thanks so much for making these edits. I understand about the list of company officers and I'm fine with leaving those out if it's not generally done. To be honest, the guidelines for company articles can be so vague and a lot comes down to what's typical, so I figured I might as well ask! Regarding the "Products" field in the infobox, in retrospect my request wasn't clear but I'm wondering if the new solutions should entirely replace the list that was there previously? This is another one of those gray areas, since the products haven't gone away, but now they're offered as part of these bundled solutions instead. Interested to hear your thoughts. Thanks again! 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 14:24, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

I was surprised to even find that WikiProject Companies actually has its own guideline, but I wasn't surprised that because companies can take many different forms, it's hard to establish one guideline for all of them, and thus the guideline is fairly vague and unhelpful. In comparison, WikiProject Cities has an excellent guideline for writing and formatting municipality articles. Back to the topic on hand, if those former individual products have still retained their names and are just marketed and sold together, then it's probably okay to keep them; the list is auto-collapsed anyway, so I don't have a problem listing too many products there.--ɱ (talk) 18:01, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for getting back to me so quickly! That makes sense to me about the products list. Like you say, having the auto-collapse means there's no worry about the list being too long. I've got some other updates for the article that I'll be proposing a bit later this week. I hope you'll be able to help with those, too! Thanks again, 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 19:14, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Updates for History and new Mergers and acquisitions section

Hi again. As promised, I've returned with a few more updates for this article. These are more significant edits than last time and include new drafts for two sections. The first is for the History section. It's been a few years since the majority of this section was written, so it's in need of some maintenance. For instance, it includes a Recent expansion subsection that covers details that are no longer recent. I retained much of the wording and information in the current draft, but re-evaluated how the information is grouped. The new draft divides company's history into three sections: Early history, Expansion and buyout, and New leadership. The New leadership section includes the most new information and focuses on Blackboard under Jay Bhatt. I also trimmed down the details about individual acquisitions throughout, which I'll explain the reasoning for further down (though you can probably guess from this Talk section heading!). The text and markup for the new History section is below:

Proposed History update

History

Early History

Blackboard Llc. was founded in 1997 by Michael Chasen and Matthew Pittinsky and began as a consulting firm contracting to the non-profit IMS Global Learning Consortium. Chasen and Pittinsky started Blackboard upon leaving KPMG Consulting where they both had worked as part of the company’s Higher Education practice. In 1998, the company merged with CourseInfo LLC, a small software provider that originated at Cornell University and was founded by Daniel Cane and Stephen Gilfus. The combined company became known as Blackboard Inc. The first line of e-learning products was branded Blackboard CourseInfo, until the CourseInfo brand was dropped in 2000. The product was initially given to teachers for free to try out and then was licensed to schools. The new company made a profit in its first year, and its sales in 1998 approached US$1 million. Other early products included Blackboard Classroom and Blackboard Campus.

By the late 1990s and early 2000s, the company had become the leading learning management system This expansion was initially funded through venture capital from a number of investors, including Pearson PLC, Dell, AOL, The Carlyle Group and Novak Biddle Venture Partners.

Overseas expansion began in the early 2000s, growing to include Asia, Australia and Europe in its service area. In particular, through a partnership with a Chinese education company, Blackboard also began providing software services to many universities in China.

Blackboard went public in June 2004 under the stock market ticker BBBB. Sale of shares in the initial public offering raised an estimated $70 million for the company, making it the second-most successful technology IPO of that year.

Company expansion and buyout

In 2006, Blackboard completed the acquisition of its largest competitor, WebCT Inc, enlarging its share of the higher education market to between 65 and 75 percent.

Over the next five years, the company invested in a series of new products and acquisitions, expanding beyond the learning management system market. New products released during this time include Blackboard Xythos, Blackboard Connect, Blackboard Mobile, Blackboard Collaborate, and Blackboard Analytics.

By 2011, Blackboard was used by over half of colleges and universities in the US. On July 1, 2011, Blackboard agreed to a $1.64 billion buyout by an investor group led by Providence Equity Partners, which was completed on October 4. Following the sale, Providence Equity Partners merged Edline, its K-12 learning system, with Blackboard. Edline was later renamed Blackboard Engage.

New leadership

Jay Bhatt succeeded Chasen as CEO of the company in October 2012. Bhatt came to the company after serving as the CEO of Progress Software. As CEO of Blackboard, Bhatt combined the company's product portfolio into offerings called solutions. He also restructured the company by market (including North America and International) rather than by product, and consolidated product development and management under new executives. It was reported in July 2014 that approximately 500 of Blackboard's 3,000 employees were hired between 2013 and 2014.

The company's key focuses under Bhatt's leadership have been: student-driven learning solutions; investing in Blackboard Learn, the company's core product; integrating the company’s portfolio of products; and building education service offerings, such as online program management. In 2013, the company introduced a platform to host massive open online courses called MOOCs, and it introduced student profiles and databases in 2014. Bhatt also changed the company's strategy for acquiring new businesses. Rather than purchasing competitors, Bhatt has stated he prefers to acquire companies based on their innovations.

In July 2014, Bhatt announced multiple product changes, including a redesign of Blackboard's UX to an interface resembling iOS, expanding the deployment options of Blackboard Learn to include self-hosted, managed hosting and public cloud, and improvements to Blackboard's mobile app.

As of July 2014, Blackboard serves approximately 17,000 schools and organizations. It holds the highest share of the education market with 75 percent of colleges and universities and more than half of K-12 districts in the US using its products and services.

As of September 2014, Blackboard had acquired MyEdu, Perceptis, and CardSmith, and Requestec under Bhatt's leadership. The acquisitions reflected Bhatt's new acquisition strategy of making investments that serve students and will lead to innovations in Blackboard's core teaching and learning products.

References

Markup

==History== ===Early history=== Blackboard Llc. was founded in 1997 by [[Michael Chasen]] and Matthew Pittinsky and began as a consulting firm contracting to the non-profit IMS Global Learning Consortium.<ref name=LSE>{{cite news |title=GEO Interactive Re OEM Agreement |url= |newspaper=London Stock Exchange Aggregated Regulatory News Service |date=October 21, 1998}}</ref> Chasen and Pittinsky started Blackboard upon leaving [[KPMG|KPMG Consulting]] where they both had worked as part of the company’s Higher Education practice.<ref name=Leibovich>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Chalks Up a Breakthrough; Its Educational Software Lets Colleges Put Classes on the Internet |first=Mark |last= Leibovich|url= |newspaper=The Washington Post |date=January 4, 1999 |page=F05}}</ref> In 1998, the company merged with [[CourseInfo LLC]], a small [[Software as a service|software provider]] that originated at [[Cornell University]] and was founded by [[Daniel Cane]] and [[Stephen Gilfus]].<ref name="Leibovich"/><ref name=Darcy2009>{{cite news |title=Years at Blackboard an education that turns employees into entrepreneurs |author=Darlene Darcy |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2009/08/03/story2.html?page=all |work=[[American City Business Journals|Washington D.C. Business Journal]] |date=9 August 2009 |accessdate=3 June 2013}}</ref><ref name=Nagler98>{{cite news |title=Senior's company helps to produce Web pages for college courses |author=Michelle Nagler |url=http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/1997/10/seniors-company-helps-produce-web-pages-college-courses course management |work=[[Cornell Chronicle]] |date=October 16, 1997 |accessdate=28 May 2014}}</ref> The combined company became known as Blackboard Inc. The first line of e-learning products was branded Blackboard CourseInfo,<ref name=BusinessWire>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Announces Release Of Blackboard CourseInfo 2.0 |newspaper=Business Wire |date=November 2, 1998}}</ref> until the CourseInfo brand was dropped in 2000.<ref name=Educational>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Aims For Standard With Building Blocks Initiative |magazine=Educational Marketer |date=November 20, 2000 |volume=31 |issue=33}}</ref> The product was initially given to teachers for free to try out and then was licensed to schools.<ref name=Burn06>{{cite news |title=Agent of Change: Blackboard CEO Michael Chasen erases the old way of learning |author=Timothy Burn |url=http://www.smartceo.com/sites/default/files/May06.pdf |work=SmartCEO |date=May 2006 |accessdate=30 May 2013}}</ref> The new company made a profit in its first year, and its sales in 1998 approached US$1 million.<ref name="Leibovich"/> Other early products included Blackboard Classroom and Blackboard Campus.<ref name=Kelleher11>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Founders’ Roots at American University |author=Anne Kelleher |url=http://www.american.edu/americantoday/campus-news/20110701-Blackboard-Pittinsky-Chasen.cfm |work=American Today |date=1 July 2011 |accessdate=30 May 2013}}</ref> By the late 1990s and early 2000s, the company had become the leading [[learning management system]]<ref name=Burn>{{cite news |title=Michael Chasen: CEO of the Year |first=Timothy |last=Burn |url=http://library.blackboard.com/docs/Press_Center/CEO_of_the_Year_2006.pdf |magazine=Washington Smart CEO |date = May 2006|accessdate=May 15, 2011}}</ref> This expansion was initially funded through venture capital from a number of investors, including [[Pearson PLC]], [[Dell]], [[AOL]], [[Carlyle Group|The Carlyle Group]] and Novak Biddle Venture Partners.<ref name=Techway>{{cite news |title=Big company on campus: Blackboard hopes an IPO will help it dominate the Internet education market |first=Alex |last=Daniels |url= |newspaper=Washington Techway |date=January 29, 2001 |page=26}}</ref><ref name=Henry>{{cite news |title=Help for an Earning Curve |first=Shannon |last=Henry |url= |newspaper=The Washington Post |date=May 11, 2000 |page=E01}}</ref> Overseas expansion began in the early 2000s, growing to include Asia, Australia and Europe in its service area.<ref name=Roger>{{cite news |title=Blackboard's success may erase bad feelings about dot-coms |first=Roger |last=Hughlett |url= |newspaper=Washington Business Journal |date=August 8, 2003 |volume=22 |issue=14 |page=3}}</ref> In particular, through a partnership with a Chinese education company, Blackboard also began providing software services to many universities in China.<ref name=Knowlton>{{cite news |title=U.S. firm makes grade in China |first=Brian |last=Knowlton |url= |newspaper=The International Herald Tribune |date=September 1, 2003 |page=11}}</ref> Blackboard went [[Initial public offering|public]] in June 2004 under the stock market [[Ticker symbol|ticker]] BBBB.<ref name=WBJ04>{{cite news |title=Fastest Growing Companies 2004: Blackboard |newspaper=Washington Business Journal |date=October 1, 2004 |volume=23 |issue=22 |page=16}}</ref> Sale of shares in the initial public offering raised an estimated $70 million for the company,<ref name="Burn"/> making it the second-most successful technology IPO of that year.<ref name=Gibbons04>{{cite news |title=Blackboard's Screeching IPO |author=Richard Gibbons |url=http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2004/06/24/blackboards-screeching-ipo.aspx |work=[[The Motley Fool]] |date=24 June 2004 |accessdate=30 May 2013}}</ref> ===Company expansion and buyout=== In 2006, Blackboard completed the acquisition of its largest competitor, [[WebCT]] Inc, enlarging its share of the higher education market to between 65 and 75 percent.<ref name=Burn06/><ref name=Carnevale/><ref name=Empson12/> Over the next five years, the company invested in a series of new products and acquisitions, expanding beyond the learning management system market.<ref name=Kolowich>{{cite news |title=Blackboard's Next Phase |first=Steve |last=Kolowich |url=http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/02/22/blackboard_evolves_its_business_strategy_in_light_of_market_saturation_in_higher_ed |newspaper=Inside Higher Ed |date=February 22, 2011 |accessdate=April 10, 2011}}</ref> New products released during this time include Blackboard Xythos,<ref name=Foster08/> Blackboard Connect, Blackboard Mobile, Blackboard Collaborate, and Blackboard Analytics.<ref name=FlookJuly13/><ref name="Kolowich"/> By 2011, Blackboard was used by over half of colleges and universities in the US.<ref name=FlookOct12>{{cite news |title= Michael Chasen ponders angel investing post-Blackboard |author= Bill Flook |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/print-edition/2012/10/19/michael-chasen-ponders-angel-investing.html |work=[[American City Business Journals|Washington Business Journal]] |date=19 October 2012 |accessdate=30 May 2013}}</ref> On July 1, 2011, Blackboard agreed to a $1.64 billion buyout by an investor group led by [[Providence Equity Partners]], which was completed on October 4.<ref>{{cite news |title=Providence Equity Partners To Buy Blackboard For About $1.64B |first=Drew |last=Fitzgerald |url=http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20110701-705527.htm |newspaper=The Wall Street Journal |date=July 1, 2011 |accessdate=August 26, 2011}}</ref><ref name="Blackboard buyout press release">{{cite web|title=Providence Equity Partners Completes Acquisition of Blackboard Inc.|url=http://www.blackboard.com/about-bb/media-center/Press-Releases.aspx?releaseid=1613617|work=Blackboard Inc.|accessdate=January 8, 2012}}</ref> Following the sale, Providence Equity Partners merged Edline, its [[K-12 (education)|K-12]] learning system, with Blackboard. [[Edline]] was later renamed Blackboard Engage.<ref name=Giovacco11>{{cite news |title=Providence Increases Blackboard Buyout Loan as Outflows Subside |author=Krista Giovacco |url=http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-09-09/providence-increases-blackboard-buyout-loan-as-outflows-subside.html |work=[[Businessweek]] |date=9 September 2011 |accessdate=17 May 2013}}</ref><ref name=Edline12>{{cite web |url=http://edline.com/news-events/edline-in-the-news/engage |title=Our Company is getting a new name! |date=11 June 2012 |work=edline.com |publisher=Edline |accessdate=17 May 2013}}</ref> ===New leadership=== Jay Bhatt succeeded Chasen as CEO of the company in October 2012.<ref name=Nagel12>{{cite news |title=Blackboard CEO Chasen To Step Down |last1=Nagel |first1=David |url=http://thejournal.com/articles/2012/10/15/blackboard-ceo-chasen-to-step-down.aspx |newspaper=THEJournal |date=15 October 2012 |accessdate=23 January 2014}}</ref> Bhatt came to the company after serving as the CEO of [[Progress Software]].<ref name=Huang14/> As CEO of Blackboard, Bhatt combined the company's product portfolio into offerings called solutions.<ref name=Feldstein14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard’s Big News that Nobody Noticed |author=Michael Feldstein |url=http://mfeldstein.com/blackboards-big-news-nobody-noticed/ |work=e-Literate |date=18 July 2014 |accessdate=2 September 2014}}</ref><ref name=Corcoran14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard's Jay Bhatt Strikes Up the Brass Band |author=Betsy Corcoran |url=https://www.edsurge.com/n/2014-07-23-blackboard-s-jay-bhatt-strikes-up-the-brass-band?elq=29068c31188e4150bde7dd6db8a3dab7&elqCampaignId=7599 |work=[[Edsurge]] |date=23 July 2014 |accessdate=2 September 2014}}</ref> He also restructured the company by market (including North America and International) rather than by product, and consolidated product development and management under new executives.<ref name=Overly14/> It was reported in July 2014 that approximately 500 of Blackboard's 3,000 employees were hired between 2013 and 2014.<ref name=Corcoran14/> The company's key focuses under Bhatt's leadership have been: student-driven learning solutions; investing in Blackboard Learn, the company's core product;<ref name=Young14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard May Double or Triple Spending on Software Development |author=Jeffrey R. Young |url=http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/blackboard-will-double-or-triple-spending-on-software-development/44743 |work=[[The Chronicle of Higher Education]] |date=11 July 2014 |accessdate=2 September 2014}}</ref> integrating the company’s portfolio of products; and building education service offerings, such as online program management.<ref name=FlookJuly13/><ref name=Weissman14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard makes another acquisition, says it will make good on past acquisitions |author=Cale Guthrie Weissman |url=http://pando.com/2014/01/15/blackboard-makes-another-acquisition-says-it-will-make-good-on-past-acquisitions/ |work=15 January 2014 |date=[[PandoDaily]] |accessdate=29 May 2014}}</ref><ref name=Heussner13/> In 2013, the company introduced a platform to host [[Massive open online course|massive open online courses]] called MOOCs, and it introduced student profiles and databases in 2014.<ref name=FlookJuly13/><ref name=Young14/><ref name=Huang14/> Bhatt also changed the company's strategy for acquiring new businesses. Rather than purchasing competitors, Bhatt has stated he prefers to acquire companies based on their innovations.<ref name=Young14/> In July 2014, Bhatt announced multiple product changes, including a redesign of Blackboard's [[User experience|UX]] to an interface resembling [[iOS]], expanding the deployment options of Blackboard Learn to include [[self-hosting|self-hosted]], [[Dedicated hosting service|managed hosting]] and [[Cloud computing|public cloud]], and improvements to Blackboard's mobile app.<ref name=Feldstein14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard’s Big News that Nobody Noticed |author=Michael Feldstein |url=http://mfeldstein.com/blackboards-big-news-nobody-noticed/ |work=e-Literate |date=18 July 2014 |accessdate=2 September 2014}}</ref><ref name=Corcoran14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard's Jay Bhatt Strikes Up the Brass Band |author=Betsy Corcoran |url=https://www.edsurge.com/n/2014-07-23-blackboard-s-jay-bhatt-strikes-up-the-brass-band?elq=29068c31188e4150bde7dd6db8a3dab7&elqCampaignId=7599 |work=[[Edsurge]] |date=23 July 2014 |accessdate=2 September 2014}}</ref> As of July 2014, Blackboard serves approximately 17,000 schools and organizations.<ref name=Corcoran14/> It holds the highest share of the education market with 75 percent of colleges and universities and more than half of K-12 districts in the US using its products and services.<ref name=Empson14>{{cite news |title=Education Giant Blackboard Buys MyEdu To Help Refresh Its Brand And Reanimate Its User Experience |author=Rip Empson |url=http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/16/education-giant-blackboard-buys-myedu-to-help-refresh-its-brand-and-reanimate-its-user-experience/ |work=[[TechCrunch]] |date=16 January 2014 |accessdate=29 May 2014}}</ref> As of September 2014, Blackboard had acquired MyEdu,<ref name=Huang14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard CEO Jay Bhatt on the Global Future of Edtech |author=Gregory T. Huang |url=http://www.xconomy.com/boston/2014/06/02/blackboard-ceo-jay-bhatt-on-the-global-future-of-edtech/ |work=[[Xconomy]] |date=2 June 2014 |accessdate=2 September 2014}}</ref> Perceptis,<ref name=Corcoran14/> and CardSmith,<ref name=Schaffhauser14/> and Requestec<ref name=OverlySept14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard scoops up British technology firm Requestec for undisclosed sum |author=Steven Overly |url=http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/capitalbusiness/blackboard-scoops-up-british-technology-firm-requestec-for-undisclosed-sum/2014/09/25/ede39098-44c1-11e4-b47c-f5889e061e5f_story.html |work=[[The Washington Post]] |date=25 September 2014 |accessdate=5 November 2014}}</ref> under Bhatt's leadership. The acquisitions reflected Bhatt's new acquisition strategy of making investments that serve students and will lead to innovations in Blackboard's core teaching and learning products.<ref name=Schaffhauser14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Expands Transact Business with CardSmith Acquisition |author=Dian Schaffhauser |url=http://thejournal.com/articles/2014/08/07/blackboard-expands-transact-business-with-cardsmith-acquisition.aspx |work=T.H.E. Journal |date=7 August 2014 |accessdate=4 September 2014}}</ref><ref name=Feldstein14/>

My second request is for a new section to follow the History section. Blackboard has a reputation for acquiring companies—and rightfully so, it has gained four companies in the last year alone. Including the details of each one of the acquisitions in the History section makes that section very long, however, and perhaps takes away from its readability. I think information about Blackboard's acquisitions is important to keep in the article as it is a major part of the company's strategy, so I'd like to propose having a separate section about mergers and acquisitions which will allow readers to find information they're interested in more easily. I've written a draft for this section below:

Mergers and acquisitions

Mergers and acquisitions

Blackboard has used the acquisition of other companies as a strategy to both limit competitors and enter new markets. Between 2006 and 2012, the company spent more than $500 million on acquisitions.

In 2001, Blackboard acquired AT&T Campuswide and CEI Special Teams, developers of ID cards that can be used for campus commerce and security. The following year, the company purchased George Washington University's course management software, Prometheus. Blackboard acquired SA Cash, a student ID rewards program developed by Student Advantage, in 2003.

In October 2005, the company announced that it was acquiring WebCT Inc., its largest rival in the education software industry. Through the acquisition, Blackboard gained over 1,400 institutional customers as well as 274 employees. In the two years leading to the merger, Blackboard's most significant growth was in the elementary and secondary education client sector. According to market research company Eduventures, the merger with WebCT increased the firm's share of the higher-education market to between 65 and 75 percent.

Following the purchase of WebCT, Blackboard purchased content management company, Xythos Software, Inc in November 2007. The company expanded into the area of emergency phone and email notifications with the acquisition of NTI Group in 2008, which became the basis for Blackboard Connect. In 2009, the acquisition of ANGEL Learning, an education software developer, increased Blackboard's client base to nearly 6,000 educational institutions, companies and government agencies. In July of the same year, the company purchased the Stanford University student-run TerribyClever Design, LLC, whose iPhone application provided the basis for the Blackboard Mobile division to develop the service for other university campuses. Blackboard then acquired Saf-T-Net, provider of mobile alerts for K-12, in March 2010.

In July 2010, the company purchased both Wimba, Inc. and Elluminate, Inc., providers of online and mobile collaboration tools, to form Blackboard Collaborate. The purchase of iStrategy, a data analysis firm, in December of 2010 led to the creation of Blackboard Analytics. Blackboard Student Services was developed from Presidium Inc., a provider of administrative and academic support services, which Blackboard acquired in January 2011.

The company merged with Edline, a provider of online communications software for K-12 schools, after Edline's owner, Providence Equity Partners, acquired Blackboard in October 2011. Edline was renamed Blackboard Engage in June 2012.

In March 2012 Blackboard acquired two companies based on Moodle's open-source software: Baltimore-based Moodlerooms Inc. and NetSpot of Adelaide, Australia. The two companies became the basis of Blackboard's Open Source Services division.

In January 2014, Blackboard made its first acquisition under the leadership of Jay Bhatt with the purchase of MyEdu, an Austin-based online education company, which provides education and career planning tools for college students. The acquisition was seen as Blackboard stepping toward a new focus on student-based software according to The Washington Post. The acquisition was followed by the purchase of Perceptis, a provider of help desk and administrative services, in July 2014. In August 2014, Blackboard acquired CardSmith, a company that offers cards for student credentials and on-campus payments. Through the acquisition, Blackboard acquired 200 customers as well as cloud-based services for its Blackboard Transact product. In September 2014, The company acquired Requestec, a provider of Web-based Real Time Communication (WebRTC) technology that allows IP telephony, video conferencing and instant messaging directly within desktop and mobile browsers.

References

Markup

==Mergers and acquisitions== Blackboard has used the acquisition of other companies as a strategy to both limit competitors and enter new markets.<ref name=Heussner13>{{cite news |title=A new Blackboard? 4 ways the ed tech giant’s new CEO hopes to win back market share |author=Ki Mae Heussner |url=https://gigaom.com/2013/07/12/a-new-blackboard-4-ways-the-ed-tech-giants-new-ceo-hopes-to-win-back-market-share/ |work=[[GigaOM]] |date=12 July 2013 |accessdate=28 May 2014}}</ref><ref name=Green12>{{cite news |title=The Long (and Open?) View on Blackboard |author=Kenneth C. Green |url=http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/digital-tweed/long-and-open-view-blackboard#sthash.b9UjZqN5.dpbs |work=[[Inside Higher Ed]] |date=2 April 2012 |accessdate=28 May 2014}}</ref><ref name=Empson12>{{cite news |title=Blackboard: With Both Co-founders Now Gone, It’s The End Of An Era For The Education Software Giant |author=Rip Empson |url= http://techcrunch.com/2012/10/18/with-both-co-founders-now-gone-its-the-end-of-an-era-for-education-software-giant-blackboard/ |work=[[TechCrunch]] |date=18 October 2012 |accessdate=30 May 2013}}</ref> Between 2006 and 2012, the company spent more than $500 million on acquisitions.<ref name=Green12/> In 2001, Blackboard acquired AT&T Campuswide and CEI Special Teams, developers of ID cards that can be used for campus commerce and security.<ref name=Irwin00>{{cite news |title=Blackboard to Chalk Up 2 Acquisitions; Smart-Card Companies Augment Technology And Customer Base |first=Neil |last=Irwin |url= |newspaper=The Washington Post |date=November 29, 2000}}</ref> The following year, the company purchased [[George Washington University|George Washington University's]] course management software, Prometheus.<ref name=Licamele02>{{cite news |title=GW’s Prometheus Merges with Software Developer Blackboard Inc. |author=Greg Licamele |url=http://www.gwu.edu/~bygeorge/march7ByG!/prometheus.html |work=By George! |date=5 March 2002 |accessdate=28 May 2014}}</ref> Blackboard acquired SA Cash, a student ID rewards program developed by Student Advantage, in 2003.<ref name=BostonBusinessJournal03>{{cite news |title=Student Advantage sells SA Cash program to Blackboard |author= |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/boston/stories/2003/02/03/daily8.html |work=[[American City Business Journals|Boston Business Journal]] |date=3 February 2003 |accessdate=28 May 2014}}</ref> In October 2005, the company announced that it was acquiring [[WebCT]] Inc., its largest rival in the education software industry.<ref name=EW05>{{cite news |title=Makers of Online Systems Merge; Blackboard buys up rival in course-handling market |magazine=Education Week |date=October 26, 2005 |volume=25 |issue=9 |page=8}}</ref> Through the acquisition, Blackboard gained over 1,400 institutional customers as well as 274 employees.<ref name=EW05/> In the two years leading to the merger, Blackboard's most significant growth was in the elementary and secondary education client sector.<ref name=EW05/> According to market research company Eduventures, the merger with WebCT increased the firm's share of the higher-education market to between 65 and 75 percent.<ref name=Carnevale>{{cite news |title=Justice Department Sees No Antitrust Concerns in Blackboard's Plan to Take Over WebCT |first=Dan |last=Carnevale |newspaper=The Chronicle of Higher Education |isbn= |issn= |oclc= |pmid= |pmd= |bibcode= |id= |date=February 17, 2006 |page=37 |volume=52 |issue=24}}</ref> Following the purchase of WebCT, Blackboard purchased content management company, Xythos Software, Inc in November 2007.<ref name=Foster08>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Acquires Another Software Company |author=Andrea Foster |url=http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/blackboard-acquires-another-software-company/3641 |work=[[The Chronicle of Higher Education]] |date=5 January 2008 |accessdate=28 May 2014}}</ref> The company expanded into the area of emergency phone and email notifications with the acquisition of NTI Group in 2008, which became the basis for Blackboard Connect.<ref name=Mider08>{{cite news |title=Blackboard to Buy NTI, Alert Maker, for $182 Million (Update1) |author=Zachary R. Mider |url=http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?sid=a0IWy6J.gKmY&pid=newsarchive |work=[[Bloomberg L.P.|Bloomberg]] |date=14 January 2008 |accessdate=29 May 2014}}</ref><ref name=FlookJuly13>{{cite news |title=Rebuilding Blackboard: How Jay Bhatt plans to resurrect one of D.C.’s original tech startups |author=Bill Flook |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/print-edition/2013/07/26/rebuilding-blackboard-how-jay-bhatt.html?page=all |work=[[American City Business Journals|Washington Business Journal]] |date=16 July 2013 |accessdate=29 May 2014}}</ref> In 2009, the acquisition of [[ANGEL Learning]], an education software developer, increased Blackboard's client base to nearly 6,000 educational institutions, companies and government agencies.<ref name=Kennedy09>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Inc.Purchases Education Software Developer |first=Kathleen |last=Kennedy |newspaper=Education Week |date=May 20, 2009 |page=4 |volume=28 |issue=32}}</ref> In July of the same year, the company purchased the [[Stanford University]] student-run TerribyClever Design, LLC, whose [[iPhone]] [[Application software|application]] provided the basis for the Blackboard Mobile division to develop the service for other university campuses.<ref name=Harlin10>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Inc. Washington, D.C. Educational Software Maker Binds Students And Faculty |first=Kevin |last=Harlin |newspaper=Investor's Business Daily |date=January 8, 2010 |page=A06}}</ref> Blackboard then acquired Saf-T-Net, provider of mobile alerts for [[K–12 (education)|K-12]], in March 2010.<ref name=Rao10>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Buys Mobile Messaging Company Saf-T-Net For $33 Million |author=Leena Rao |url=http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/08/blackboard-buys-mobile-messaging-company-saf-t-net-for-33-million/ |work=[[TechCrunch]] |date=8 March 2010 |accessdate=29 May 2014}}</ref> In July 2010, the company purchased both Wimba, Inc. and Elluminate, Inc., providers of online and mobile collaboration tools, to form Blackboard Collaborate. The purchase of iStrategy, a data analysis firm, in December of 2010 led to the creation of Blackboard Analytics.<ref name="Kolowich"/> Blackboard Student Services was developed from Presidium Inc., a provider of administrative and academic support services, which Blackboard acquired in January 2011.<ref name=Pres>{{cite news |title=In Bid to Expand Into Student Services, Blackboard Buys Presidium |first=Jeff |last=Young |url=http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/in-bid-to-expand-into-student-services-blackboard-buys-presidium/28965 |newspaper=The Chronicle of Higher Education |date=January 12, 2011 |accessdate=August 30, 2011}}</ref> The company merged with [[Edline]], a provider of online communications software for K-12 schools, after Edline's owner, Providence Equity Partners, acquired Blackboard in October 2011.<ref name=Clabaugh11>{{cite news |title=Blackboard private, merges with Edline |author=Jeff Clabaugh |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/news/2011/10/05/blackboard-private-merges-with-edline.html |work=[[American City Business Journals|Washington Business Journal]] |date=5 October 2011|accessdate=17 May 2013}}</ref> Edline was renamed Blackboard Engage in June 2012.<ref name=Giovacco11>{{cite news |title=Providence Increases Blackboard Buyout Loan as Outflows Subside |author=Krista Giovacco |url=http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-09-09/providence-increases-blackboard-buyout-loan-as-outflows-subside.html |work=[[Businessweek]] |date=9 September 2011 |accessdate=17 May 2013}}</ref><ref name=Edline12>{{cite web |url=http://edline.com/news-events/edline-in-the-news/engage |title=Our Company is getting a new name! |date=11 June 2012 |work=edline.com |publisher=Edline |accessdate=17 May 2013}}</ref> In March 2012 Blackboard acquired two companies based on [[Moodle]]'s open-source software: [[Baltimore]]-based Moodlerooms Inc. and NetSpot of [[Adelaide]], Australia. The two companies became the basis of Blackboard's Open Source Services division.<ref name=Clabaugh>{{cite news |title=Blackboard makes Moodle acquisitions |author=Jeff Clabaugh |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/news/2012/03/26/blackboard-makes-moodle-acquisitions.html |work=[[American City Business Journals |Washington Business Journal]] |date=26 March 2012 |accessdate=5 September 2014}}</ref><ref name=Kolowich12>{{cite news |title=Blackboard's Open-Source Pivot |author=Steve Kolowich |url=http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/03/27/blackboard-buys-moodlerooms-creates-open-source-division#sthash.eds4ewfp.dpbs |work=[[Inside Higher Ed]]|date=27 March 2012 |accessdate=28 May 2014}}</ref> In January 2014, Blackboard made its first acquisition under the leadership of Jay Bhatt with the purchase of MyEdu, an [[Austin]]-based online education company, which provides education and career planning tools for college students. The acquisition was seen as Blackboard stepping toward a new focus on student-based software according to ''[[The Washington Post]]''.<ref name=Overly14>{{cite news |title=The Download: Blackboard makes first acquisition under CEO Jay Bhatt |last1=Overly |first1=Steven|url=http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/capitalbusiness/the-download-blackboard-makes-first-acquisition-under-ceo-jay-bhatt/2014/01/16/35e7dc1e-7d5d-11e3-9556-4a4bf7bcbd84_story.html |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |date=16 January 2014 |accessdate=23 January 2014}}</ref> The acquisition was followed by the purchase of Perceptis, a provider of [[help desk]] and administrative services, in July 2014.<ref name=Biemiller14>{{cite news |title=QuickWire: Blackboard Swallows a Small Competitor |author= Lawrence Biemiller |url=http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/quickwire-blackboard-swallows-a-small-competitor/53761 |work=[[The Chronicle of Higher Education]] |date=8 July 2014 |accessdate=4 September 2014}}</ref><ref name=Riddell14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard expands student services with Perceptis acquisition |author=Roger Riddell |url=http://www.educationdive.com/news/blackboard-expands-student-services-with-perceptis-acquisition/283456/ |work=EducationDive |date=8 July 2014 |accessdate=5 September 2014}}</ref> In August 2014, Blackboard acquired CardSmith, a company that offers cards for student credentials and on-campus payments. Through the acquisition, Blackboard acquired 200 customers as well as cloud-based services for its Blackboard Transact product.<ref name=Schaffhauser14/> In September 2014, The company acquired Requestec, a provider of [[WebRTC|Web-based Real Time Communication (WebRTC)]] technology that allows [[Voice over IP| IP telephony]], [[Videoconferencing|video conferencing]] and [[instant messaging]] directly within desktop and mobile browsers.<ref name=OverlySept14/>

Just a quick note about both drafts: because I've used material that's already in the article, in several places the citation is the short version, rather than the full one as the full cite is given elsewhere in the article. This means there's some gaps in the reflists in this request. Hopefully this won't be a problem since the material in question is already in the article, so does not need to have its sources spot-checked.

I realize this is quite a bit of new material, so I invite editors to take their time reviewing it and let me know if there are any questions. If there are no questions, I would appreciate if another editor could make the edits if they agree with them. Thanks. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 20:40, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

With many thanks to, ChrisGualtieri, this request is now complete. The sections have been moved into the live article. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 12:34, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Marketing

This article looks like it was written by BlackBoard's marcom department. The Dissident Aggressor 16:58, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

I've removed some redundant information and some material that was obvious corporate spin. There's more to be done. This is a mess. The Dissident Aggressor 14:09, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

I've added a well-sourced criticism section to balance out some of the spin provided by these COI editors. The Dissident Aggressor 16:19, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Hi DissidentAggressor, first of all, thanks for finding and fixing the error in the two references I had switched in my proposed draft for the introduction. I'm not sure how that happened and I apologize for the confusion. Second, as you'll see from discussions above, any material proposed for this page has been reviewed by independent editors before being placed into this article. Both myself and WWB Too have been clear about our COI here and specifically sought review of our suggested changes on that basis. We each have been circumspect about what changes we've requested and have aimed to provide neutral content, not "spin". I'm sorry to hear, therefore, that you feel there are areas of this article that are problematic and respectfully disagree that this article "is a mess". I'd be happy to discuss any specific issues with you.

I see that you've removed the explanation of Blackboard's switch to offering solutions instead of individual products. Without this section under Products and services, the details about the products and services is now a little misleading, seeming to suggest that they're available individually. If the text of the section was an issue, perhaps we could find a compromise wording that you feel would work better? If you just oppose there being a section called Solutions, how about working some wording to explain the change into the existing sections on Products and services?

Also, I understand the addition of the criticism of Blackboard, though generally criticism sections are discouraged, which is why you'll see that previously WWB Too had suggested incorporating criticism into the Products and services section. Likewise the criticism you've added could be incorporated into that section. What do you think?

Finally, regarding the "infamous" line added to the introduction, if you feel it's necessary to include in the introduction and other editors agree, then I won't push the issue. However, I do think that it's really unusual and POV to make this the second line of the article. While I know that this is a bit "other stuff exists", even companies that are primarily known for their controversies (e.g. Blackwater (now Academi), Monsanto, Halliburton) don't have that as the second line of their Wikipedia articles. What do you think about moving the line into the second paragraph to balance the details about Blackboard's products' use in 75% of US colleges? 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 20:51, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Regarding any switch to solutions, I can't imagine that anyone outside of either the VP of sales or your CMO cares about solutions vs. products. If you're worried about your potential customers being misled, then you need to understand that this page is not here to educate your customers on your offerings. In fact, the history section is far too detailed and company-centric.

I added the criticism because the criticism of the company is extreme - as a "most hated" company, it is highly relevant. Such criticism is indeed an exceptional claim but it is supported by multiple reliable sources in the article (as well as dozens of less reliable sources not included in the article). Such extreme criticism of your employer is relevant and should be part of the lede. As I said below, if your company is infamous for something, I'd say that it belongs pretty high in the lede. The Dissident Aggressor 23:28, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps Rhiannon can respond more eloquently, but it appears you're just a disgruntled consumer, and therefore have as much conflict of interest as Rhiannon does. I believe that details about products and services are relevant, although perhaps the wording "Solutions" isn't the best choice, being a biased-sounding marketing term. I can support her that the recent changes were approved by uninvolved editors and are far from being 'a mess'; as well, with my primary interest on this Wiki relating to history, I can inform you that you can never be too detailed with writing history on Wikipedia. If needed, the article History of Blackboard could be created. As for being company-centric, one would expect a history of a company to be 'company-centric', no?--ɱ (talk · vbm) 00:54, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Full disclosure: I have never used any Blackboard product, nor do I have any connection to the company. I happened upon this article through the "random article" link and have endeavored to improve this article that has been heavily influenced - whitewashed even - by paid COI editors. The Dissident Aggressor 01:24, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

That's good to hear, but Rhiannon isn't a regular employee that would be proud of the company in any way and reflect that in the writing; the job is just to write the article, and I as well feel that it's fairly neutral. Articles, including ones on companies, aren't supposed to be heavy in support or criticism. There's no section in the Barack Obama article primarily voicing criticism; and so you can't say that just because there's a lot of extreme criticism, it has to be spotlighted. And I saw that most of your sources were popular news media, sources that often are very opinionated and biased, so I would expect harsh criticism from them, and wouldn't consider them reliable sources for many facts. And I'd say it's unfair to call Blackboard a 'most hated' company; that's wording that no neutral source, and certainly not Wikipedia, would ever use.--ɱ (talk · vbm) 01:57, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Uh, no. The source that called them "infamous" was Rhiannon's! It was one of the two that she switched talking about the zillions of customers (see below). That's how I discovered that they were a disliked company. I had no idea. Now, I wonder why you're assailing the source that I used (that s/he provided) when the article is filled with press releases as sources. Why don't you pitch in and clean this PR piece up ? Now why you're assuming bad faith on my part, in the face of obvious corprorate editing is a good question. The Dissident Aggressor 04:32, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

If only I had time, I would get more deeply involved. I am very busy with real-life work and thus I'm only commenting a bit. As for 'taking your side versus hers', I've helped Rhiannon upon request to approve her paid editing in the past, and usually I have very few changes; her writing and neutrality is usually good. I didn't push any of her changes for this article because I've been busy and because I had more doubts with the text. Now press releases can be fine when citing simple facts, but I wouldn't use them to cite any controversial information. I had less faith in your editing because of your widespread content removal without consensus, as well as that you're adding criticisms like many would to George W. Bush. Now that I understand where you're coming from, I'm more open towards your changes and opinion. Regardless, your approach is still somewhat one-sided; I don't believe the article should be heavy in opinion-based statements like "most hated" or "infamous". Statistical facts can stand for themselves in drawing a reader towards criticism or praise. My largest work, Briarcliff Manor, New York, is one that I'd like to say is boring; I don't believe I have any opinion-based statements; they're all just facts backed up by neutral, reliable sources. That should be our ideal here.--ɱ (talk · vbm) 22:49, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Hi Ɱ and Dissident Aggressor, sorry for being late in the day on coming back to this conversation. To clarify, as Ɱ says, I am not an employee at Blackboard, but am consulting with them on Wikipedia to help them offer updates to this article in the right way (ie. not making direct edits themselves). Again, Dissident Aggressor I'm sorry to hear you're unhappy with information in this article -- although my work has only involved the History, Mergers and acquisitions and a few smaller updates within the introduction and Products and services, I'd be happy to help with any fixes you think are needed to make this article more neutral. I see your point that there are a few press releases used in the article and it would seem reasonable to me to remove those, though the article isn't "filled with" them by any means. (Also, just to note: unless I'm very mistaken, my drafted proposals did not add any press releases.) Regarding the criticism of the company's products, like I said earlier, if you and other editors think it reasonable to include, then I won't push the matter. I do just have a couple of points of feedback: 1. would it not work better to integrate the criticism into the Products and services section, to show how the products are received by consumers?; 2. rather than having so many quotes with statements like "infamous" and "most hated" what about paraphrasing and summarizing the key criticisms instead? 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 00:01, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Claims in this article need to be verified

In the context of my statements above, the first reference I checked came up with failed verification and has been tagged as such.

I think this article needs to be gone over very carefully. I'm afraid that this smacks of corporate manipulation. The Dissident Aggressor 14:41, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

So both claims where the company has zillions of customers failed verification - they were switched. I fixed it. In doing so, I found the Empson article that said the company's software was "infamous" for negative qualities. Odd that the COI editors failed to mention that. I've added it to the lede. If the company becomes infamous for other things, that should go there too. The Dissident Aggressor 15:07, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

I have buckled to the pressure from the paid editor and removed the negative info about the company from the lede. The Dissident Aggressor 05:47, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Look, I want to keep this civil and polite, but that's a complete mischaracterization. I did not ask you to remove the criticism. As I explained above, it seemed POV to have such criticism as the second line of the intro and I asked what you thought about moving it into the second paragraph. I'm fine with you removing it, but I dislike intensely the insinuation that I applied any pressure for you to make an edit you didn't want to. That's not how I work. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 00:12, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Dissident Agressor asked me to comment. I have some experience of my own with the product and therefore I do not want to make any evaluation or substantial edits. I did make some copyedits. But the best way in general of resolving disputes about emphasis is to look for additional sources. DGG ( talk ) 05:35, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Replacing press release citations

Hi to anyone watching this page, also pinging DissidentAggressor, Ɱ, DGG, ChrisGualtieri and Jonpatterns who have either reviewed my suggestions here before, or with whom I had discussed this article late last year. I'd like to follow up on DissidentAggressor's previously noted concerns about the use of press releases in this article, also the length of the material discussing Acquisitions and the details included in the Criticism section, to see if we can work towards some improvements we can all agree upon.

Starting with (hopefully) the simplest of the above, the use of press releases, I'd like to propose some independent sources that can be used to replace the four press releases currently used in the article:

• The first source to replace is #10, a BusinessWire source used in the Early history and Blackboard Learn sections. Below are the lines of text the reference supports, with suggested replacement sources:
  • Text:The combined company was renamed Blackboard Inc. and its first line of e-learning products was branded Blackboard CourseInfo
  • <ref name=Flook13>{{cite news |title=Gilfus Ventures takes on Blackboard, Instructure with Adrenna purchase |last1=Flook |first1=Bill |url=http://www.nexis.com/docview/getDocForCuiReq?lni=59KF-BB21-F05M-K527&csi=8399&oc=00240&perma=true |newspaper=[[American City Business Journals|Washington Business Journal]] |date=14 October 2013 |accessdate=24 April 2015}}</ref>
  • <ref name=Hammer07>{{cite news |title=Blackboard alums plan networking site |last1=Hammer |first1=Ben |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2007/06/18/story8.html |newspaper=[[American City Business Journals|Washington Business Journal]] |date=18 June 2007 |accessdate=6 April 2015}}</ref>
• The second source to replace is #28, used under Company expansion and buy-out, where it supports just the final clause of the sentence (confirming the completion date of the buyout):
  • Text: On July 1, 2011, Blackboard agreed to a $1.64 billion buyout by an investor group led by Providence Equity Partners, completed on October 4, 2011.
  • <ref name=Korn14>{{cite web |url=http://blogs.wsj.com/privateequity/2014/11/03/providences-blackboard-to-offer-chegg-tutoring-serivces-through-its-software/ |title=Providence’s Blackboard to Offer Chegg Tutoring Services Through Its Software |author=Melissa Korn |date=3 November 2014 |work=Private Equity Beat |publisher=[[Wall Street Journal]] |accessdate=27 April 2015}}</ref>
• The third press release source to replace is #30, used in Company expansion and buy-out, Mergers and acquisitions and Other products to support the detail about Edline being renamed to Blackboard Engage. As the new source below doesn't mention the date of the renaming, in the second instance, I recommend removing "June 2012". Also, seeing these details listed out, it strikes me that it's rather repetitive, so perhaps could just be mentioned the one time--either in the History or in Acquisitions?:
  • Text: Following the sale, Providence Equity Partners merged Edline, its K-12 learning system, with Blackboard. Edline was later renamed Blackboard Engage.
  • Text: Edline was renamed Blackboard Engage in June 2012.
  • Text: In October 2011, following Blackboard's merger with Edline, a provider of online learning products for the K-12 market, Edline's products became known as Blackboard Engage.
  • <ref name=Schaffhauser12>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Connect 5 Adds New Mass Notification Features |last1=Schaffhauser |first1=Dian |url=http://thejournal.com/articles/2012/09/17/blackboard-connect-5-adds-new-mass-notification-features.aspx?=THE21 |newspaper=THE Journal |date=17 September 2012 |accessdate=24 April 2015}}</ref>
• Finally, source #57 for the company locations under Operations:
  • Text: The company's headquarters are in Washington, D.C. and it has offices in Asia, Australia, Europe and in several locations in North America.
  • <ref name=BloombergBusiness>{{cite news |title=Company Overview of Blackboard Inc. |url=http://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=25643 |accessdate=24 April 2015}}</ref>

While I was reviewing the citations, I also noticed that there's currently a Blogspot blog used in the Other products section to support a detail about Blackboard Collaborate being used by the Open University. I don't think this information is crucial, so it (and the citation) could be removed.

Due to my conflict of interest with this article, since I have been working as a consultant to Blackboard Inc., it would be best for others to review the above and make the changes if they are appropriate. I hope that editors will be able to help with this. Thanks in advance, 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 21:05, 27 April 2015 (UTC)

I do not see these changes to be controversial and have implemented the same. Anyone is free to revert. Regards - NQ (talk) 01:46, 28 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks NQ! Much appreciated. I'll be back here soon to discuss the Criticism and Acquisitions sections, til then, if anyone has any questions, feel free to ping me here or on my Talk page. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 21:07, 28 April 2015 (UTC)

Addressing tag on Mergers and acquisitions

Hi again! As I mentioned above, I'd like to help resolve the tag on the Mergers and acquisitions section of the article. The current section is, admittedly, quite lengthy. I think this speaks to Blackboard's history of growth being driven heavily by acquiring competitors and related companies—something that is frequently mentioned in the company's media coverage. Considering that the company is well known for its aggressive acquisition strategy, I do feel that the section should be retained. However, I can understand that it may come across as being a lot of detail that many readers may be less interested in.

Below, I've put together a more condensed draft for the section. What I've tried to do here is to give more context to the mentions of the acquisitions, while paring down the detail about individual acquisitions. That way, the impact of the acquisitions for the company's development and offerings is more clear: ie. readers are getting a better understanding of how these acquisitions have led to the Blackboard that exists today. I've also weeded out some of the smaller acquisitions that are perhaps less interesting to readers or impactful on the company's development. Can folks take a look over this and see if it would be a reasonable replacement for the existing section? I'm hoping that this draft will resolve the tag, or at least be a starting point towards it.

Condensed Mergers and acquisitions draft

Blackboard has used the acquisition of other companies as a strategy to both limit competitors and enter new markets. Between 2006 and 2012, the company spent more than $500 million on acquisitions.

Competing learning management platforms that were acquired by Blackboard in order to absorb their users and reduce competition include: George Washington University's course management software, Prometheus, in 2002; and WebCT Inc., its largest rival in the education software industry, in 2005. According to market research company Eduventures, the merger with WebCT increased the firm's share of the higher-education market to between 65 and 75 percent. In 2009, the acquisition of ANGEL Learning, an education software developer, increased Blackboard's client base to nearly 6,000 educational institutions, companies and government agencies.

The company has also made acquisitions in order to expand its product base with other education-related services and software. Such acquisitions include: NTI Group in 2008, which became the basis for Blackboard Connect; providers of online and mobile collaboration tools, Wimba, Inc. and Elluminate, Inc. in 2010, to form Blackboard Collaborate; iStrategy in December 2010, which led to the creation of Blackboard Analytics; Presidium Inc. in 2011, which developed into Blackboard Student Services. Following the company's merger with Edline in 2011, Edline was later renamed Blackboard Engage. In March 2012, Blackboard acquired Moodlerooms Inc. and NetSpot of Adelaide, Australia, which then became the basis of Blackboard's Open Source Services division.

From January 2014 to April 2015, Blackboard acquired nine companies, including: MyEdu, an Austin-based online education company; Perceptis, a provider of help desk and administrative services; CardSmith, a company that offered cards for student ID and on-campus payments; Requestec, a provider of technology for VoIP, video conferencing and instant messaging; and Schoolwires, a company that specialized in building school websites.

References

Markup

Blackboard has used the acquisition of other companies as a strategy to both limit competitors and enter new markets.<ref name=Empson12>{{cite news |title=Blackboard: With Both Co-founders Now Gone, It’s The End Of An Era For The Education Software Giant |author=Rip Empson |url= http://techcrunch.com/2012/10/18/with-both-co-founders-now-gone-its-the-end-of-an-era-for-education-software-giant-blackboard/ |work=[[TechCrunch]] |date=October 18, 2012 |accessdate=May 30, 2013}}</ref><ref name=Heussner13>{{cite news |title=A new Blackboard? 4 ways the ed tech giant’s new CEO hopes to win back market share |author=Ki Mae Heussner |url=https://gigaom.com/2013/07/12/a-new-blackboard-4-ways-the-ed-tech-giants-new-ceo-hopes-to-win-back-market-share/ |work=[[GigaOM]] |date=July 12, 2013 |accessdate=May 28, 2014}}</ref><ref name=Green12>{{cite news |title=The Long (and Open?) View on Blackboard |author=Kenneth C. Green |url=http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/digital-tweed/long-and-open-view-blackboard#sthash.b9UjZqN5.dpbs |work=[[Inside Higher Ed]] |date=April 2, 2012 |accessdate=May 28, 2014}}</ref> Between 2006 and 2012, the company spent more than $500 million on acquisitions.<ref name=Green12/>

Competing learning management platforms that were acquired by Blackboard in order to absorb their users and reduce competition include:<ref name=FlookJuly13>{{cite news |title=Rebuilding Blackboard: How Jay Bhatt plans to resurrect one of D.C.’s original tech startups |author=Bill Flook |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/print-edition/2013/07/26/rebuilding-blackboard-how-jay-bhatt.html?page=all |work=[[American City Business Journals|Washington Business Journal]] |date=July 16, 2013 |accessdate=May 29, 2014}}</ref> [[George Washington University|George Washington University's]] course management software, Prometheus, in 2002;<ref name=Licamele02>{{cite news |title=GW’s Prometheus Merges with Software Developer Blackboard Inc. |author=Greg Licamele |url=http://www.gwu.edu/~bygeorge/march7ByG!/prometheus.html |work=By George! |date=March 5, 2002 |accessdate=May 28, 2014}}</ref> and [[WebCT]] Inc., its largest rival in the education software industry, in 2005.<ref name=EW05>{{cite news |title=Makers of Online Systems Merge; Blackboard buys up rival in course-handling market |magazine=Education Week |date=October 26, 2005 |volume=25 |issue=9 |page=8}}</ref> According to market research company Eduventures, the merger with WebCT increased the firm's share of the higher-education market to between 65 and 75 percent.<ref name=Carnevale>{{cite news |title=Justice Department Sees No Antitrust Concerns in Blackboard's Plan to Take Over WebCT |first=Dan |last=Carnevale |newspaper=The Chronicle of Higher Education |isbn= |issn= |oclc= |pmid= |pmd= |bibcode= |id= |date=February 17, 2006 |page=37 |volume=52 |issue=24}}</ref> In 2009, the acquisition of [[ANGEL Learning]], an education software developer, increased Blackboard's client base to nearly 6,000 educational institutions, companies and government agencies.<ref name=Kennedy09>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Inc.Purchases Education Software Developer |first=Kathleen |last=Kennedy |newspaper=Education Week |date=May 20, 2009 |page=4 |volume=28 |issue=32}}</ref>

The company has also made acquisitions in order to expand its product base with other education-related services and software.<ref name=FlookJuly13/> Such acquisitions include: NTI Group in 2008, which became the basis for Blackboard Connect;<ref name=FlookJuly13/><ref name=Mider08>{{cite news |title=Blackboard to Buy NTI, Alert Maker, for $182 Million (Update1) |author=Zachary R. Mider |url=http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?sid=a0IWy6J.gKmY&pid=newsarchive |work=[[Bloomberg L.P.|Bloomberg]] |date=January 14, 2008 |accessdate=May 29, 2014}}</ref> providers of online and mobile collaboration tools, Wimba, Inc. and Elluminate, Inc. in 2010, to form Blackboard Collaborate; iStrategy in December 2010, which led to the creation of Blackboard Analytics;<ref name=Kolowich>{{cite news |title=Blackboard's Next Phase |first=Steve |last=Kolowich |url=http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/02/22/blackboard_evolves_its_business_strategy_in_light_of_market_saturation_in_higher_ed |newspaper=Inside Higher Ed |date=February 22, 2011 |accessdate=April 10, 2011}}</ref> Presidium Inc. in 2011, which developed into Blackboard Student Services.<ref name=Pres>{{cite news |title=In Bid to Expand Into Student Services, Blackboard Buys Presidium |first=Jeff |last=Young |url=http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/in-bid-to-expand-into-student-services-blackboard-buys-presidium/28965 |newspaper=The Chronicle of Higher Education |date=January 12, 2011 |accessdate=August 30, 2011}}</ref> Following the company's merger with [[Edline]] in 2011,<ref name=Clabaugh11>{{cite news |title=Blackboard private, merges with Edline |author=Jeff Clabaugh |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/news/2011/10/05/blackboard-private-merges-with-edline.html |work=[[American City Business Journals|Washington Business Journal]] |date=October 5, 2011|accessdate=May 17, 2013}}</ref> Edline was later renamed Blackboard Engage.<ref name=Giovacco11>{{cite news |title=Providence Increases Blackboard Buyout Loan as Outflows Subside |author=Krista Giovacco |url=http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-09-09/providence-increases-blackboard-buyout-loan-as-outflows-subside.html |work=[[Businessweek]] |date=September 9, 2011 |accessdate=May 17, 2013}}</ref> In March 2012, Blackboard acquired Moodlerooms Inc. and NetSpot of [[Adelaide]], Australia, which then became the basis of Blackboard's Open Source Services division.<ref name=Clabaugh>{{cite news |title=Blackboard makes Moodle acquisitions |author=Jeff Clabaugh |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/news/2012/03/26/blackboard-makes-moodle-acquisitions.html |work=[[American City Business Journals|Washington Business Journal]] |date=March 26, 2012 |accessdate=September 5, 2014}}</ref><ref name=Kolowich12>{{cite news |title=Blackboard's Open-Source Pivot |author=Steve Kolowich |url=http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/03/27/blackboard-buys-moodlerooms-creates-open-source-division#sthash.eds4ewfp.dpbs |work=[[Inside Higher Ed]]|date=March 27, 2012 |accessdate=May 28, 2014}}</ref>

From January 2014 to April 2015, Blackboard acquired nine companies,<ref name=EdSurge15>{{cite web |url=https://www.edsurge.com/n/2015-04-13-blackboard-snags-remote-learner-uk-in-its-seventh-acquisition-in-a-year |title=Blackboard Snags Remote-Learner UK in Its Ninth Acquisition in a Year |author= |date=April 13, 2015 |work=[[Edsurge|EdSurge]] |publisher= |accessdate= May 1, 2015}}</ref><ref name=EdSurge15a>{{cite web |url=https://www.edsurge.com/n/2015-02-04-blackboard-s-next-acquisition-schoolwires |title=Blackboard's Next Acquisition: Schoolwires |author= |date=February 4, 2015 |work=[[Edsurge|EdSurge]]|publisher= |accessdate=7 May 2015}}</ref> including: MyEdu, an [[Austin]]-based online education company;<ref name=Overly14>{{cite news |title=The Download: Blackboard makes first acquisition under CEO Jay Bhatt |last1=Overly |first1=Steven|url=http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/capitalbusiness/the-download-blackboard-makes-first-acquisition-under-ceo-jay-bhatt/2014/01/16/35e7dc1e-7d5d-11e3-9556-4a4bf7bcbd84_story.html |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |date=January 16, 2014 |accessdate=January 23, 2014}}</ref> Perceptis, a provider of [[help desk]] and administrative services;<ref name=Biemiller14>{{cite news |title=QuickWire: Blackboard Swallows a Small Competitor |author= Lawrence Biemiller |url=http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/quickwire-blackboard-swallows-a-small-competitor/53761 |work=[[The Chronicle of Higher Education]] |date=July 8, 2014 |accessdate=September 4, 2014}}</ref><ref name=Riddell14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard expands student services with Perceptis acquisition |author=Roger Riddell |url=http://www.educationdive.com/news/blackboard-expands-student-services-with-perceptis-acquisition/283456/ |work=EducationDive |date=July 8, 2014 |accessdate=September 5, 2014}}</ref> CardSmith, a company that offered cards for student ID and on-campus payments;<ref name=Schaffhauser14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard Expands Transact Business with CardSmith Acquisition |author=Dian Schaffhauser |url=http://thejournal.com/articles/2014/08/07/blackboard-expands-transact-business-with-cardsmith-acquisition.aspx |work=T.H.E. Journal |date=August 7, 2014 |accessdate=September 4, 2014}}</ref> Requestec, a provider of technology for [[Voice over IP|VoIP]], [[Videoconferencing|video conferencing]] and [[instant messaging]];<ref name=OverlySept14>{{cite news |title=Blackboard scoops up British technology firm Requestec for undisclosed sum |author=Steven Overly |url=http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/capitalbusiness/blackboard-scoops-up-british-technology-firm-requestec-for-undisclosed-sum/2014/09/25/ede39098-44c1-11e4-b47c-f5889e061e5f_story.html |work=[[The Washington Post]] |date=September 25, 2014 |accessdate=November 5, 2014}}</ref> and [[Schoolwires]], a company that specialized in building school websites.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://venturebeat.com/2015/02/04/blackboard-acquires-schoolwires-to-help-build-school-websites-and-apps/ |title=Ed-tech giant Blackboard acquires Schoolwires to help build school websites and apps for K-12 students |author=Paul Sawers |date=February 4, 2015 |work=[[VentureBeat]] |publisher= |accessdate=7 May 2015}}</ref>

I've mentioned previously, but just to be crystal clear: I'm here as a consultant to Blackboard and due to that COI I will not make any edits to the article. Instead, I hope to discuss the draft here and I'm very much open to feedback and / or additional suggestions for improving this section. Please let me know if you have any questions or thoughts on how best to address the Mergers and acquisitions information. Thanks, 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 19:37, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

Thanks to NQ for reviewing this suggestion and making the update in the article. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 15:18, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Discussing Criticism section

Hi again, all. In my previous post above, I'd noted that I'd like to discuss the Criticism section of the article, and I'm now returning to that topic. Generally, I'm of the opinion that criticism or controversy sections should be avoided, per WP:CRITS, and wonder if editors would be in favor of integrating the information from the Criticism into sections of the article where it might best fit.

If so, here is my suggestion for placing the material within other sections:

• The details in the first paragraph could be included in the History section in the Company expansion and buyout subsection or start of the New leadership section, since their sources are from 2012 and 2011, respectively
• The sentence about the user interfaces could be added to the Blackboard Learn section (I also have an update to suggest to this information, see draft below)

On the other hand, I understand if other editors feel that a dedicated section is the best place to collate criticism of the company and its products. If it is preferable to retain the Criticism section, then I'd like to suggest a small addition and a few adjustments to the existing text:

• I've found a couple of recent sources that note that the user interface, which was a key area of criticism, is being updated
• Currently, the section gives no indication in the text as to when the noted criticisms are from. I'd suggest adding in the source dates to the text to give readers more idea of when each criticism arose. This would help show, for example, that it wasn't a really early criticism that is no longer relevant
• Also, there are direct quotes not attributed in the text of the article, although WP:MOSQUOTE would indicate they should be in cases such as these where opinions are given, so I'd suggest adding in a brief attribution

The below shows the section with my suggestions in green:

Criticism suggestions

According to a TechCrunch article from 2012, despite its success, Blackboard had become "one of the most disliked — even detested — companies in education." In December 2011, Fast Company reported that 93% of respondents to the Amplicate customer opinion survey "hate" the company.

The company's products' user interfaces became "infamous as a part of academic life that was to be endured, not enjoyed" according to TechCrunch writer Rip Empson in 2014. According to EdSurge, as of 2015, the company was in the process of updating its learning management system and the user interface within it, noting that navigation of the latter had been a cause of "dismay" for long-time users.

References

Markup

According to a ''TechCrunch'' article from 2012, despite its success, Blackboard had become "one of the most disliked — even detested — companies in education."<ref name=Empson-18-Oct-2012>{{cite news|last1=Empson|first1=Rip|title=Blackboard: With Both Co-founders Now Gone, It’s The End Of An Era For The Education Software Giant|url=http://techcrunch.com/2012/10/18/with-both-co-founders-now-gone-its-the-end-of-an-era-for-education-software-giant-blackboard/|accessdate=13 December 2014|publisher=[[Techcrunch]]|date=18 October 2012}}</ref> In December 2011, ''[[Fast Company (magazine)|Fast Company]]'' reported that 93% of respondents to the Amplicate customer opinion survey "hate" the company.<ref name=kamenetz-13-dec-14>{{cite news|last1=Kamenetz|first1=Anya|title=The Ingenious Business Model Behind Coursekit, A Tumblr For Higher Education|url=http://www.fastcompany.com/1799173/ingenious-business-model-behind-coursekit-tumblr-higher-education|accessdate=13 December 2014|work=[[Fast Company (magazine)|Fast Company]]}}</ref>

The company's products' user interfaces became "infamous as a part of academic life that was to be endured, not enjoyed" according to ''TechCrunch'' writer Rip Empson in 2014.<ref name=Empson14/> According to ''EdSurge'', as of 2015, the company was in the process of updating its learning management system and the user interface within it, noting that navigation of the latter had been a cause of "dismay" for long-time users.<ref name=EdSurge15b>{{cite web |url=https://www.edsurge.com/blackboard-inc |title=Blackboard Inc. |author= |date= |work=[[Edsurge|EdSurge]]|publisher= |accessdate=7 May 2015}}</ref><ref name=EdSurge15a>{{cite web |url=https://www.edsurge.com/n/2015-02-04-blackboard-s-next-acquisition-schoolwires |title=Blackboard's Next Acquisition: Schoolwires |author= |date=4 February 2015 |work=[[Edsurge|EdSurge]]|publisher= |accessdate=7 May 2015}}</ref>

Once again, I won't make any of these edits myself due to my COI, so I encourage others to review, offer their thoughts and make such edits as are most appropriate. Thanks, 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 22:07, 22 May 2015 (UTC)

Quick ping note for editors who've discussed this article with me before, and / or reviewed my edits here: Ɱ, DGG, ChrisGualtieri, Jonpatterns and NQ, as well as pinging DissidentAggressor who added the current Criticism section. Your input would be most welcome here. Thanks in advance! 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 19:12, 1 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree that a criticism section is usually not desirable, as WP:CRITS explains. However if another thought it is, then that probably warrants more discussion. However, I did make the wording additions you suggested.--ɱ (talk · vbm) 19:29, 1 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, Ɱ. Likewise, I'm curious to hear others' thoughts on this. Just a quick note on your edits: I see you added an {{as of}} template into the new final sentence of the section, which is helpful, but looks like it needs to have the lowercase parameter added. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 20:05, 1 June 2015 (UTC)

Yeah you're right.--ɱ (talk · vbm) 20:23, 1 June 2015 (UTC)

Hi again, just checking in here to see if anyone else had thoughts about the Criticism section and how it should be handled? Are any other editors in favor of splitting up this information into relevant sections, rather than retaining a standalone Criticism section? 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 21:38, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

I've merged the criticism into the body of the article. - NQ (talk) 20:33, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

Appreciate all the input here and thanks NQ for your edits. I hope that if there are any disagreements about these changes, editors can discuss it here. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 16:33, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

Market share details

It looks like the market share statistics are from the techcrunch article that's a few years old now, and which was likely from a company press release. While BB likely peaked at around 75% marketshare, the best market data I can find seems to indicate that their higher ed market share has steadily declined and is now closer to 34% (rather than 75%). This source is only counting institutions with over 500 FTE - http://edutechnica.com/2016/10/03/4th-annual-lms-data-update/

Not sure on K12 data, but I imagine that it's now similarly out of date. You can see the longer term higher ed trend here http://mfeldstein.com/state-higher-ed-lms-market-spring-2016/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.162.246.204 (talk) 23:28, 21 October 2016 (UTC)

In the UK, Moodle is by far the dominant player in the VLE environment, and I suspect this might be true in the US too. There has been a steady trend in the last 15 years of universities who had been on WebCT moving to Moodle and next to no move in the other direction. This is anecdotal / first hand, but at an annual MoodleMoot in the UK I chatted about this during the lunch break to a Blackboard representative on one of the vendor stands that were provided display space. He confirmed that the Blackboard customer base had, indeed, declined steadily for a number of years and that a lot of their revenue now comes from providing support to Moodle sites.

The information in the article is clearly well out of date. Perhaps there are other, more up-to-date sources that could provide a picture of current market share. Moodle appears to have been dominant, globally, for a number of years. See, for example, https://mfeldstein.wpengine.com/academic-lms-market-share-view-across-four-global-regions/