The new system will not use a hardware key of any kind, but it will require a periodic call to a license server on the Internet, unless you expressly choose an offline activation (for an air-gapped computer that cannot connect to the Internet).
However, it will not be required that you are connected to the Internet at all times when using the software, and although we don’t yet know what the interval for mandatory license checks will be, I would expect it to be in line with the policies followed by other software vendors. Microsoft requires you to reconnect once every 39 days; Adobe once every 99 days; PreSonus Sphere once every 3 days; EastWest ComposerCloud every 30 days; and so on.
We also anticipate that it will be possible to authorise the software on more than one computer, but, again, the details remain to be worked out.
You can rest assured that we will let you know what we have decided in good time before the introduction of the new license management system, and that we are listening to all the feedback we have been receiving since we made this announcement last week (and indeed for many years before that).
For the time being, I’m going to now close this thread to new posts. When there is more information to share, we will do so.