The present invention extends to methods, systems, and computer program products for licensing protected content to application sets. Embodiments of the invention permit a local machine to increase its participation in authorizing access to protected content. For example, an operating system within an appropriate computing environment is permitted to determine if an application is authorized to access protected content. Thus, the application is relieved from having to store a publishing license. Further, authorization decisions are partially distributed, easing the resource burden on a protection server. Accordingly, embodiments of the invention can facilitate more robust and efficient authorization decisions when access to protected content is requested.