Blackboard Inc. and iParadigms, the owners of the Turnitin plagiarism-detection service, have settled out of court, avoiding litigation. Blackboard had filed a lawsuit against iParadigms after that company sent letters to Blackboard informing officials there about iParadigms’ new patent covering its plagiarism-detection software. Blackboard, which had just acquired plagiarism-detection software of its own, took the letters as a legal threat and filed a “pre-emptive” lawsuit against iParadigms to prevent being sued itself.
Both companies had indicated that they wanted to stay out of court. Within weeks of the spat, they are now back to being business partners. Click here for more Chronicle coverage. —Dan Carnevale
