Over the weekend I was reading this article on Inside Higher Ed (maybe I should be posting over at multiliterratus, but oh well...)

In any case, the author of this post talks about how how Wired's "The good enough revolution" pertains to academia. Personally I agree that some of what the author writes are quite valid arguments - but I would like to play devil's advocate for a moment from an IT management perspective.

Yes, Blackboard does stink.
Yes, Blackboard is like trying to move an elephant
Yes, Blackboard has a somewhat huge learning curve if you are new to it.
However...
Blackboard has (theoretically) 24x7 support, so if a teacher or student can't do something in it, they can read a warm body that can help them out.

Conversely, with those who go off an roll-their-own there are legal/privacy issues such as FURPA that instructors need to know about (they should know about them anyway - but most seem to not know), and there is the issue of support. If you roll-your-own, then you can't really expect IT support from your organization, unless of course you've got someone at the top batting for you. This in turn leads to you being BOTH instructor AND full time technical support for your class, which is problematic if you are teaching many classes.

I do agree with the whole lets-get-out-of-blackboard thing, but IT needs to be onboard.