I am having a little trouble understanding the XNA Express licensing terms.

I am the current president of the Ball State University Video Game Developers club. Some of us are interested at trying our hand using XNA. The question is though, weather we can purchase a single membership to be used by the club or if each member would have to buy a membership.

Thank you.

You only need a membership to deploy and run on the Xbox 360. So if you're running your game on Windows only, you don't need a membership. So anyone in your club who wanted to play their game (or someone else's game) on the Xbox 360 would need a membership.

If your club members wanted to deploy their projects to their own 360s, then I believe a separate payment would be required for each box (the Creators Club subscription is purchased through the Xbox Live Marketplace, which means it's linked to a single box).

However, I'd seriously think about contacting Microsoft directly to see if they'd gift you some subs or support your club in some other way. They're dead serious about supporting XNA in the academic field and that may very well extend to your group. It's worth a try and you'll never know until you give it a go :)

Let us know how you get on.

The XNA Creators Club membership is bound to a single Xbox Live account and hence that gamertag.  Follow up with me via email through xna@microsoft.com with more information on your club and needs.

--dave