Licence key

[paulhelen]

Hi all well been fooling around with different pc to see if i could use some of my old gear to fee up my main pc
every time i deactivated my copy of blue iris and all haS been well when i put it on a different pc to try .
but today it said i have tried to many times
so email sent to support to see what can be done just hope i don't have to get a new licence key and it can be rest

All the best everyone

Paul

[YrbkMgr]

From the help file (BlueIris.PDF):

The software is licensed per-PC (or VM). You may re-install and move the license to new hardware up to 10 times before it must be manually reset by an email to support. A license includes basic support and maintenance which means access to email software support and same-version updates for one year from first activation.

Which is stoopid for a licensee to have to get approval to install it on whatever PC they see fit at the moment. But... it appears that dems da rulz.

[paulhelen]

Good news just had a email and the licence key has been reset

[TimG]

Which is stoopid for a licensee to have to get approval to install it on whatever PC they see fit at the moment. But... it appears that dems da rulz.

I think it is to stop somebody attempting to use the same key on multiple pc's at the same time. It must have happened so they protect against it. It's been fairly normal with my home automation software(s) too. Annoying but surmountable.

[YrbkMgr]

I think it is to stop somebody attempting to use the same key on multiple pc's at the same time. It must have happened so they protect against it. It's been fairly normal with my home automation software(s) too. Annoying but surmountable.

Can't say I agree with that. They already prevent BI from running on multiple machines at the same time with the same license key. Since, they allow you to move the license to new hardware up to 10 times and already implement safeguards against the same key being used on two machines at one time, it's not a theft or license violation prevention issue. What they are doing is preventing a user from putting it on any machine they choose after an imposed limit (10) unless they say it's okay. Why should a user have to get their okay?

Functionally, it doesn't affect me and likely doesn't affect most licensees. But I respectfully object to requiring their permission for a user to put it on whatever machine they see fit ad infinitum. Photoshop employed a practice like this when they came out with their Creative Suite 2 products and that made the license a machine license, not a user license. They abandoned that practice when they went to cloud subscriptions like MSft.

The OP clearly needed their permission to continue testing machines or moving the installation from one machine to another for whatever personal/professional reasons, and received it. If he didn't have to give a reason for why he was doing what he was doing, why does he need their permission? Is it the presumption that it's an "audit" mechanism to prevent nefarious use?

I ran a company that sold a software product and learned that at some point, efforts to prevent unauthorized use demonstrates a mistrust of customers and becomes throwing the baby out with the bathwater. People who have "skillz" at hacking/cracking and like won't be stopped.

In summary, a user shouldn't need permission to legally move and use the software to any machine they like, and the incidence of unauthorized use has to be extremely low compared to those who have legitimate reasons to move the installation.

[Matts1984]

I support the model.. as long as they continue to be responsive in reasonable situations. They give the ability to transfer the license and have a pretty high threshold at 10. I would be willing to bet that is rarely approached by anyone so this does help weed out the nefarious use. While the OP did have a justifiable case, most people aren't going to hop around to 10 systems (or have 10 systems available to test anyway). Microsoft has their own model limiting to 3 installs I believe and you can do a phone 'honor system' to reset that count. This is no different other than they use an email instead of an automated phone prompt - which I think it's fair to say BI is not quite as large or have the need as MSFT.

Is it inconvenient for the few that hit the limit while testing it? Sure, but the OP got it resolved fairly easily. Does it cut down on abuse? Yep. While I agree that - most likely - the incidence of illegal use is probably low, so is the incidence of an admin crossing this threshold.

[YrbkMgr]

I support the model.. as long as they continue to be responsive in reasonable situations. They give the ability to transfer the license and have a pretty high threshold at 10. I would be willing to bet that is rarely approached by anyone so this does help weed out the nefarious use. While the OP did have a justifiable case, most people aren't going to hop around to 10 systems (or have 10 systems available to test anyway). Microsoft has their own model limiting to 3 installs I believe and you can do a phone 'honor system' to reset that count. This is no different other than they use an email instead of an automated phone prompt - which I think it's fair to say BI is not quite as large or have the need as MSFT.

Is it inconvenient for the few that hit the limit while testing it? Sure, but the OP got it resolved fairly easily. Does it cut down on abuse? Yep. While I agree that - most likely - the incidence of illegal use is probably low, so is the incidence of an admin crossing this threshold.

Those are entirely fair points. I hereby rescind my previous criticism. Thanks for sharing your opinion.