The Start8 EULA has always made it clear the product is licensed for one machine and has not been changed.  Having said that the new activation system should have some flexibility and should be handling the desktop + laptop scenario based on customer feedback.

If you are having issues and have only activated on one machine then contact support@stardock.com so they can investigate as this is not by design and there is clearly a problem somewhere.

Also note there were activation server issues on Monday so if you tried then it may have been causing the problem.

... so has the licensing policy changed?????

[/quote]

I guess the policy has changed
I use a MacBook with dual boot (OSX and) Windows 8 installed in the Bootcamp partition.
Under OSX I can start the Windows 8 installation with VM Fusion in a virtual environment.
Since the last update (2 weeks?), in the virtual environment Start8 will a activate.
When I enter my activation data, the following message appears:
Unable to activate Start8. The Licence i currently associated with a different computer.

Nicely done. I bought this almost two years ago, as soon it was out of beta I believe and I've been running it on several computers since and I distinctly remember being allowed to do so. Of course all the updates have replaced all the eula's so I have no way of knowing for sure. I do know that I'm uninstalling it since your latest updates have "corrected" the licensing issue and I really don't need my computer phoning home for a $5 product, really tacky. I have recommended this to many people but of course will no longer do do. See ya.

Another poster on a related thread posted this evidence in the Stardock CEO's twitter feed that no, this was NOT "always" in the EULA:

https://twitter.com/draginol/status/254390217967026177

Although in that thread, the Stardock rep replied that, "You will notice he was replying to the question which asked about a laptop and a desktop", I had to reply that I found that reply rather disingenuous.  His actual statement was very consistent with the broadly understood expectation of 1-license-per-nonbusinesses-user-regardless-of-machine-count, at the time:  "You just need 1 license for all the machines you personally use."

 

This was, indeed, the expectation generally stated in multiple forums at the time.  Your marketing folks may have had some idea *in their minds* that for personal use only 2 machines were intended, but that is NOT what was conveyed.

Now, I DO understand that since that time the EULA has changed, and personally that doesn't present a problem for me, nor do I find the new terms unreasonable (though a bit disappointing). But I also understand the disaffection of those who originally installed Start8 with that expectation, which WAS widely understood *at that time.*