You might consider offering more free or cheap versions, like a student edition (cheap with no proof required) and a free trial. Wolfram, for instance, does both. Not many real companies will cheat, and it's better to have users who can't pay using an official version than a cracked one. Perhaps they start using it in an un-funded skunkworks project, then buy a full license when the project gets funded.
This shows that you have never dealt with companies in 3rd world countries. When money is tight, which is always in those countries, there is not a cheap-enough price that you can make them pay. They want the benefit of the product but they do nit want to pay anything for it.
So, a free trial version in those places, will turn into a perpetual "free" trial. Same for "no proof needed" student/academic versions.
Unfortunately for the original poster, there is no solution to such a situation. Especially considering, they do nit want to spend an arm and a leg on legal enforcement, for a measly few thousand dollars worth of licensing fees.
The only solution I can see for this kind of problem is to design the product to run purely online, leaving nothing more than a UI on the customers' hardware, but since the product is out, there is no way to put that cat back into the bag. May be they should consider future, enhanced versions of their software to run online only.
Yes, people who can't pay will keep renewing the free trial indefinitely. Since you weren't going to get any money out of them anyway, there's no loss. More people using your sw costs you nothing, and has various benefits, including:
- if those people someday move to a big company that can afford it, they'll be familiar with your sw
- they may blog about it or publish results from it, giving you free advertising
- reduces the market for a lower-cost version of your product, making new competitors less likely to form
Add then they can unfairly compete with the people that DO pay for your software because their very not having to fairly compensate for the benefits of your labour yet still gain from it puts them ahead of some 'sucker' who pays. I would rather that people willing to steal from me don't compete with my paying customers. Even though their usage doesn't make you less 'whole' it does impact the ecosystem your business operates within.
Pricing segmentation based on market and understanding their circumstances goes a long way
Help people who want to pay, most don't. And they won't, regardless of how many hoops you put as 'copy protection'. Yes doing it purely online will work, but that has its issues as well
