Blackboard and WebCT merge

Acidangl writes "Blackboard and WebCT, leading providers of enterprise software and services to the education industry have announced plans to merge." From the article: "Under terms of the agreement, Blackboard will acquire WebCT in a cash transaction for $180 million, which values the offer at approximately $154 million, net of WebCT's August 31, 2005 cash balance of $26 million. The ultimate value of the offer will vary depending on WebCT's cash balance at closing."

Comments

Wow

[zegebbers]

Given how many institutions use one of these or both, this will have a big impact on choice. Some of the horror stories that I've heard about webct admin aren't good. On the other hand, there was the Georgia Tech student who found the vulnerability in Blackboard.

Hopefully someone can provide some sort of competition to this company.

Re:Wow

[b17bmbr]

I used WebCT last year for an online class. I really didn't like it. Perhaps it is because I have been doing web development for years, I found the whole interface and page creation process totally distracting and useless. I also didn't like its test and quiz creation features. My district was part of a statewide testing program and we have settled on WebCT but I'd rather give teachers a choice or some more freedom. WebCT forced things to be a certain way far too much for my tastes. I imagine for someone with no experience designing web pages, then maybe it'll be helpful. But, it's just too confusing to create links, topics, etc. Overall I'd give it a C-. But then again, I was a little jaded. Also, the kids didn't like it too much either. They had trouble with some of the features and it was confusig for them.

I look forward to..

[SillySnake]

the merging of two terrible web based systems for an even worse web based one.

Seriously, it's often so hard to find where a professor has put the file you're tyring to find. With so many different places to put things, it just gets students confused. Not to mention all the trouble one has to go to in order to find a specific post, send an e-mail, etc..

I don't mean to troll, but both systems could stand to see quite a bit of tweaking.

Being that its Slashdot and all...

[Deslok]

Why pay for their service when you can go open source for free?

Moodle

The school I'm at made the shift and hasn't looked back(well, aside from the technophobe teachers who grumble about learning something new a few years after they started to grasp the old system).

Great...

[sH4RD]

So when does either company provide technology which can actually scale to user load, is actually powered by modern technology, and generally isn't a Piece of Shit (tm)?

I've used my fair share of Blackboard, and I've had some great experiences:
1) The ability to embed Flash and JavaScript into free response questions. 2) The time Blackboard's database started crashing, which caused it to take at least 5 tries to login. 3) And better yet, the 1 in 2 odds that when you finally logged it, it would be as someone else as the database switched your tokens. 4) Best of all, the 1 in 20 odds that person would be a teacher or professor.

And I've heard WebCT isn't much better...

two bad choices

[commodoresloat]

I have some insight on this topic as a university professor. I've used both systems, and I was on the Academic Technology Committee when it was advising the CTO and CIO on purchasing decisions for such systems. We wound up paying for both. As you say, they both suck, and I'm sure whatever unholy combination is produced will suck even worse. At the time - 1999 or 2000 I believe - "open source" was something my colleagues on the committee had heard of but didn't know anything about, and the CTO and CIO were computer-savvy but looked on open source with disdain (this made sense as they were constantly wined and dined by folks who represent closed source companies looking for big deals). I was teaching summers at UCLA at the time and had the opportunity to use ClassWeb, an open source alternative to such tools. My experience with the tool was exemplary; I thought it was easy to use, it fulfilled the necessary functions and was not needlessly confusing for students. It was also free. Best of all, the developer worked at UCLA so when there were features I wanted I was able to ask him for them and they were available in days. It was truly a classic case of the superiority of the open source model working well. For much less the price we paid for Blackboard and CT, which all the students complain about, we could have hired programmers to handle coding issues on classweb and had an open source solution that we could fine tune at will. But when I made the suggestion, the feeling around the table (particularly from the CTO and CIO) was, shut up hippie.... Today I don't use any such tools -- I still code my course web pages by hand using html and have some very primitive open source discussion board technology for discussions. I think it's necessary to have courses online these days for various reasons, but the tools offered by these companies are needlessly ornate and confusing. The open source model makes sense in general but especially in public university settings where costs are a relevant factor and where the freedom to tinker with code brings with it additional educational benefits.

in other news,

[moosesocks]

In related news, shares of WebCT were down $5 after news of the merger, although this is expected to rise by 20% at the end of the semester after the curve is applied.