Most faculty just want a simple place to put course documents and announcements and Blackboard (and Moodle for that matter) are just overkill for most of them. The main reason it seems is that they're purchased by committees who make decisions by checking off boxes on a large feature list, where it doesn't seem to matter if anyone actually uses those features. You can tell how bad it's gotten since many faculty are already doing their own thing, i.e. using Google groups, pbwiki or making their own simple websites.
Due to my frustration using WebCT for classes I TA'd as a graduate student, I recently partnered with another student to build a simple alternative in Django. Check it out at http://thiscourse.com It's designed to provide access to the crucial features as quickly as possible. We're always interested in getting feedback and have had a few classes use it successfully so far.
Due to my frustration using WebCT for classes I TA'd as a graduate student, I recently partnered with another student to build a simple alternative in Django. Check it out at http://thiscourse.com It's designed to provide access to the crucial features as quickly as possible. We're always interested in getting feedback and have had a few classes use it successfully so far.