Blackboard has made a legal non-revokable non-assert patent pledge which formalizes their position on patents with respect to open source course management systems like Moodle, ATutor, Sakai, and many others. For many months Bb has said “they had no intention to sue universities” and the community has asked Bb to put that in writing – this pledge is “in writing”. :)
The patent pledge is available at:
http://www.blackboard.com/patent
Sakai and Educause have prepared a statement which should hit the web sites of Sakai and Educause soon. I attach the final version below.

The Boards of Directors of the Sakai Foundation and of EDUCAUSE recognize the patent pledge announced on February 1, 2007 by Blackboard as a step in a more positive direction for the community, to the extent that it offers some comfort to a portion of the academic community that uses open source or homegrown systems. In the pledge, Blackboard states that it will not assert certain patents against open source or home grown systems bundled with no proprietary software. We particularly welcome the inclusion of pending patents, the clarification on the commercial support, customization, hosting or maintenance of open source systems and the worldwide nature of Blackboard