I have been thinking about Unity's new licensing and plan and wonder how it will work. I realize Unity will not want to give out too much for details on their plans. It seems like uninformed such as me this plan is just doomed for problems and failure.
First of all is the revenue count. As a indie developer I am not a publicly traded company, so how will unity validate if my sales for any 12 month period reach a threshold. Is it on me to report it? If so, how does unity validate my report? Will I be required to provide audited tax records? Unity could scour distribution systems like Steam and Google play but that is time intensive not to mention a bunch of other issues like using different developer/publisher names on different platforms. What about private contract sales such as to a school where they wouldn't want to get updates through an engine like steam? It seems like there's a lot of ways one could obscure the reporting.
Then there is the install counter. It sounds like to me unity runtime will be reporting home about an install. What information is it collecting? Did the person installing the game agree to that collection of information? If the runtime is calling home, and there is not an internet connection (possible if I am selling a unity built product in a private transaction such as to a school which locks down the computer infrastructure), what happens? And as a developer, could I not make my installer fanagle the system to redirect a call home elsewhere (localhost or my own service)? It seems like someone will find ways around it.