Most music teachers and all computer technology specialist know that it is illegal to purchase a single copy of any software and load it onto a network for multiple student use. Site licenses are becoming more important as schools add computers to various areas of a school building. A site license can be used to cover all computers in one physical location, i.e. one school building. Consider the high school music director who wants to load a practice software product on six computers in the band room area, three computers in the choral room, four practice rooms and the seven computers in the school library. If none of these computers are attached to a server, then a site license may be the solution.
Companies have several different formulas to determine the cost of site licenses.
Electronic Courseware Systems, for instance, charges seven times the retail price for a site license at one physical location. Other companies have adjusted charges based upon number of students, number of computers, hours of usage or other logical approaches. A site license cannot be combined with a lab network license, however. The cost of site licenses can be even lower per student than the network licenses. With availability of the software loaded on every computer at a physical site, students have access to more facilities than one or two network laboratories.