Blackboard Makes Unlikely Move Into Open-Source World

Signaling a dramatic shift in strategy and product offerings, Blackboard Inc. last week purchased two companies built on the Moodle platform, the free learning-management system popular mostly because it is an alternative to Blackboard.

For an undisclosed amount, Blackboard bought Moodlerooms and NetSpot , two companies that help users manage and customize the Moodle learning-management-system, or LMS, software.

Moodle is free and "open source," which means its code is available for anyone to use to improve products and build new ones. That's often hard for resource-strapped schools to do, so they pay companies like Moodlerooms and NetSpot to do it for them. The companies often pay Moodle royalties to help sustain the platform. Learning-management systems do everything from organizing administrative tasks to delivering online content...