Thanks for the links, I'll check them out when I get home.

As for your excellent question about leaving protection out completely... well, it deserves more thought than I'm giving it at the moment so I'll let you know my current thinking at the moment.

I usually go through life with the attitude that most people are basically good and won't do anything illegal. They want to like fairly and treat others with respect.

This opinion has taken several beatings lately to the point where Now I think that a lot of people are basically good, but most will do what they think everyone else is doing.. as long as they don't get into trouble.. and what everyone else is doing is getting free stuff off the net instead of paying for it.
We could talk for hours on this subject alone... but we'd need beer

At the moment I believe that if I leave protection off completely, I'll get no sales at all. So my current though process is release a Demo which has no protection and a Full Version for downloading but will only work beyond the 1st level with an activation key of some sort.

While I admire Stardock's decision, I don't think it works for everyone.
I hate the Steam Idea with a passion, I think it's far too heavy handed and treats everyone like a potential criminal. (I don't think everyone is a criminal, I just think that people don't think enough about the conciquences of their actions before doing something they know is wrong but don't think it'll do any harm.)

But I didn't mind the copy protection used in Jets 'n' Guns.. a Demo I downloaded.. played for 1 hour (the demo expires after 1 hour of play), the game stopped and said, if I want to continue, I should buy it.. do I want to do it now?.. Yes please. I purchased it, loved it. Enjoyed the experience entirely.

I guess the real question is.. How can I enable an honest person to buy and play my game without subjecting them to hassle which may drive them away?