Stephen Downes' posts on Blackboard are a good place to start reading up on the Blackboard patent. I think this is important because I believe that universities should be collaborating on building open source versions of the software systems they need to operate, that universities should be investing in the development of human capital (i.e. hiring developers to develop and support these systems) rather then investing in licences from software that, in many cases, requires just as many developers to customize and support. The Blackboard patent risks impeding the development of open source e-learning and learning management systems.