I've read through several WPMU tutorials and threads about the Membership plug-in and I've created a test site which replicates the access levels used in the guide. But I don't think I want to use a hierarchy such as Free/Premium/VIP.
I want customers be able to purchase access to separate "collections" of audio and video files. For example visitors would see the following collections available purchase:
Collection A
Collection B
Collection C
They can purchase access to one or more of these collections at any time, and without having to cancel a "subscription" to another collection. Basically I want them to be able to stack access levels. Subscriptions will be indefinite, no renewal necessary.
Can Membership do this - and if so, how? Or is there another plug in which does this better? Keep in mind that I want to be able to protect audio and video files from being downloaded or shared.
I've read through several WPMU tutorials and threads about the Membership plug-in and I've created a test site which replicates the access levels used in the guide. But I don't think I want to use a hierarchy such as Free/Premium/VIP.
I want customers be able to purchase access to separate "collections" of audio and video files. For example visitors would see the following collections available purchase:
Collection A
Collection B
Collection C
They can purchase access to one or more of these collections at any time, and without having to cancel a "subscription" to another collection. Basically I want them to be able to stack access levels. Subscriptions will be indefinite, no renewal necessary.
Can Membership do this - and if so, how? Or is there another plug in which does this better? Keep in mind that I want to be able to protect audio and video files from being downloaded or shared.
The only issue you'll have with membership is that you really can't run multiple subscriptions at the same time. So if someone buys 'A' and then wants access to 'B'. You'd need to provide an upgrade path that goes 'A+B' and 'A+B+C' (obviously all combinations would have to be included). This isn't ideal, but at this point it's the only way to do it.
I'm not aware of another plugin that would handle this scenario any better. Perhaps someone else around here will have a different idea though.
So what do people normally do when they want to provide access to a single audio or video file? (A file which can not be downloaded and has a masked URL.) Instead of providing collections, I could conceivably sell access to single files and people could purchase them using a standard shopping cart method. Do you know if MarketPress can accomplish that?
sir sure Market Press can handle this last scenario you inquired about.
It will also cloak the links for the digital downloads automatically plus the customer will be able to choose more then one product at a time adding them to their cart before check out :-)
If you need any further assistance please let us know :-)
I can't figure out how to create a digital product which can not be downloaded. Ideally, I want the link the customer receives in the confirmation email to take him or her to the page where the video is embedded on my site. Two important things here: the true URL of this page is masked and the video itself is hosted on a third party server e.g. Amazon S3.
Please Note, this following idea has not been tested specifically with this plugin though I have used it with other software and it worked successfully :-)
Since we can create a download in the as a digital product in Marketpress, the fact that it cloaks the link ..... here it comes .....
why not create the product in MarketPress as normal using a fake uploaded file as the digital download since the uploader will only take certain file types - then go into the database and directly change the fake filename or url to that of your cloaked url :-)
Let me know if you implement this and it works for you :-) I have reopened this subject so that I may keep track of it easily.
Hmm, .. that sounds possible but I was hoping for something cleaner than that. Imagine if I have a lot of files or don't always have convenient access to my DB. If you have other ideas, please keep them coming! Thanks..
Tables for Market Press - you can always search the tables searching for your exact fake upload to replace it with your url rather then going through the tables by eye :-)
sir I had another idea too - we could probably modify the code of the plugin to allow url's to be entered into the download link this would take care of the need to search the database.
Of course this is considered customizing the plugin and if it works possibly be added as a feature request to be permanently incorporated into the plugin.
Re: Adding URL option in File Uploader
Hi Joe, this is the idea I'm leaning towards as well. I'm not sure what customization involves here.. probably time and money, right? Please let me know. Maybe it's just a quick fix? :-)
The other Plan B idea I have is to create an image or text file as the downloadable part of each product. In that download is the link to the final URL destination. However, this would require that I merge Marketpress with Membership so at least that the URL can't be shared with non-Members. I tested this already and it works but it's not really ideal. It requires that people pay something upfront to simply have the privilege to access individual files. And that something has to be sufficient enough to ward off the freeloaders.
So the holy grail is to be able to sell unique access to a video for each individual customer. Where the video can't be downloaded and access can not be shared in any way.
Well, I'm thinking I want folks to watch a video from a post (custom type in my case). (I'm using Blip.tv as my CDN and I just embed the video into the post and disable download.) I don't care about hiding the URL, in fact, I don't want to hide it as I want folks to share it and when visitors come, they're prompted to purchase or join. I just want to make sure no one can be logged in more than once (there's gotta be a plug-in for this).
Something of a MarketPress + Membership is beginning to make sense, though I have not played with Marketplace yet.
sir I tested out my proposal about modifying the download link to the url of the stream, and it worked to some degree - Indeed the link was encrypted, However it downloaded a picture of the entire video page, but the video itself was unusable. I used a Youtube URL as the stream.
So obviously this idea is a no go.
Next you were referring to plan B.
In this case something like this is what I would use for the link: http://easyexpire.com/
so if they share it - it does not work.
We have definitely gotten beyond the scope of this plugins current purpose and features.
Therefore I can only now propose to make it a feature request to allow the selling of external links, encrypted, that expire by amount of downloads or time.
@Joe
Thanks for the submitting the feature request, Joe. Just a note: I personally don't need the link expiration feature because I want people to be able to return to the video page as often as they want. (I was just hoping there was a way they browser URL could be masked as well.) If adding such a feature would hold up implementing the feature request of selling external links, I'd prefer not to include it.
@Chris
If you want be people to be able to log in only once, then how is that any functionally different than setting up a "pay per view" service? I think there are established methods for that, but I don't think WPMUDev offers them.
Well, I played around and unfortunately, Membership + MarketPress combined is not getting me closer to a solution (yet, anyhow!).
Mark, the option of creating "fake downloads" seems like more to manage than necessary.
I found a couple plug-ins from other developers that do what I need, though. Won't post their names as I want to keep the love here at WPMU. :-)
It's referred to as "pay per view" (for live events) and "video on demand" (for archives). Which works just as you expect from a cable TV provider, but on the Web. Essentially, customers who have purchased access are given a unique URL for a post with the embed on it. The system authenticates and allows access. If someone tries to access without authenticating, the page renders a notice with an option to purchase. The system will not allow more than one visitor with the same authentication credentials to access the site at the same time.
Additionally, the plugins I found allow the site owner to control how many times it can be downloaded, plus a host of other customization options.
The above solution would be very seamless. It seems WPMU's solutions are sooo close to being able to do this. So, I'm hoping we can figure this out without work-arounds, fake downloads, hiding content (except where appropriate of course), etc.
Hi Chris, I don't think it's improper to mention other companies' products here if the reason you are mentioning them is for problem solving and not simply advertising. In fact, it probably helps the WPMU developers to know.
Since there is no private messaging function on this board (or not one that I know of), can you go ahead and specify the other WP plug-in you are using? Does it have a feature where it can limit the number of views (and I mean views, not downloads) for embedded video on demand? I'd be really interested in hearing about that.
Mark was absolutely correct telling that a solution for someone else's product is fine within reason.
Not only does it help solve or offer solutions to our members which is one of the main priorities, idea of, and functions of WPMU Dev - it can also give ideas to us as to what we could develop in the future to further meet and serve our clients needs that we do not already have.
After our deep discussions between us three and attempts to come up with an exclusive WPMU solution, it is obvious for this particular task regarding the vending and distribution of streaming video, that we do not at the moment have an easy turn key solution.
There could be a viable solution with our brand new built from the ground up Membership Plugin soon be released, but that remains to be seen within if it would specifically function for this video streaming niche.
So Chris if you have a good solution for this video streaming project, please do not hesitate to let us in on it :-)
Joe, the problem I am running into now is that I can't seem to hide the MarketPress menus and product pages from people who have not registered as a paid Member yet. Currently, a visitor can purchase a product without being logged in as a Member.
Responses (23)
Sales & Support Lead — 2nd February 2012 20:03 #
Hiya Mark,
The only issue you'll have with membership is that you really can't run multiple subscriptions at the same time. So if someone buys 'A' and then wants access to 'B'. You'd need to provide an upgrade path that goes 'A+B' and 'A+B+C' (obviously all combinations would have to be included). This isn't ideal, but at this point it's the only way to do it.
I'm not aware of another plugin that would handle this scenario any better. Perhaps someone else around here will have a different idea though.
Thanks!
Member — 2nd February 2012 20:29 #
Thanks for the reply, Mason.
So what do people normally do when they want to provide access to a single audio or video file? (A file which can not be downloaded and has a masked URL.) Instead of providing collections, I could conceivably sell access to single files and people could purchase them using a standard shopping cart method. Do you know if MarketPress can accomplish that?
Member — 3rd February 2012 10:16 #
Hi Mason, I moved this topic to an existing thread in the Marketpress area and proposed a solution. Can you comment on it over there? Thanks!
Support Kangaroo — 3rd February 2012 10:24 #
Greetings mark77210 :-)
sir sure Market Press can handle this last scenario you inquired about.
It will also cloak the links for the digital downloads automatically plus the customer will be able to choose more then one product at a time adding them to their cart before check out :-)
If you need any further assistance please let us know :-)
Joe :-)
Member — 3rd February 2012 12:25 #
Hi Joe, thanks for the lightning fast response!
I can't figure out how to create a digital product which can not be downloaded. Ideally, I want the link the customer receives in the confirmation email to take him or her to the page where the video is embedded on my site. Two important things here: the true URL of this page is masked and the video itself is hosted on a third party server e.g. Amazon S3.
Suggestions? Am I missing something basic?
Support Kangaroo — 3rd February 2012 12:36 #
Greetings mark77210 :-)
how about this sir :-)
Please Note, this following idea has not been tested specifically with this plugin though I have used it with other software and it worked successfully :-)
Since we can create a download in the as a digital product in Marketpress, the fact that it cloaks the link ..... here it comes .....
why not create the product in MarketPress as normal using a fake uploaded file as the digital download since the uploader will only take certain file types - then go into the database and directly change the fake filename or url to that of your cloaked url :-)
Let me know if you implement this and it works for you :-) I have reopened this subject so that I may keep track of it easily.
Joe :-)
Member — 3rd February 2012 13:45 #
Hmm, .. that sounds possible but I was hoping for something cleaner than that. Imagine if I have a lot of files or don't always have convenient access to my DB. If you have other ideas, please keep them coming! Thanks..
Support Kangaroo — 3rd February 2012 15:09 #
Greetings mark77210 :-)
please sir all due respect but "what if's" ..... lol
Anyway :-) access to the Database Navicat
Tables for Market Press - you can always search the tables searching for your exact fake upload to replace it with your url rather then going through the tables by eye :-)
Joe :-)
Support Kangaroo — 3rd February 2012 15:24 #
Greetings mark77210 :-)
sir I had another idea too - we could probably modify the code of the plugin to allow url's to be entered into the download link this would take care of the need to search the database.
Of course this is considered customizing the plugin and if it works possibly be added as a feature request to be permanently incorporated into the plugin.
Joe :-)
Member — 3rd February 2012 15:52 #
Re: Adding URL option in File Uploader
Hi Joe, this is the idea I'm leaning towards as well. I'm not sure what customization involves here.. probably time and money, right? Please let me know. Maybe it's just a quick fix? :-)
The other Plan B idea I have is to create an image or text file as the downloadable part of each product. In that download is the link to the final URL destination. However, this would require that I merge Marketpress with Membership so at least that the URL can't be shared with non-Members. I tested this already and it works but it's not really ideal. It requires that people pay something upfront to simply have the privilege to access individual files. And that something has to be sufficient enough to ward off the freeloaders.
So the holy grail is to be able to sell unique access to a video for each individual customer. Where the video can't be downloaded and access can not be shared in any way.
(Chris, any new thoughts on this?)
Member — 3rd February 2012 20:35 #
Well, I've been fooling around with this for a bit and I think the "plan B" is the best solution I have come up with so far.
Joe, please let me know when you have more info on the custom work / feature request mentioned above.
Member — 3rd February 2012 20:49 #
Hey there, Mark!
Well, I'm thinking I want folks to watch a video from a post (custom type in my case). (I'm using Blip.tv as my CDN and I just embed the video into the post and disable download.) I don't care about hiding the URL, in fact, I don't want to hide it as I want folks to share it and when visitors come, they're prompted to purchase or join. I just want to make sure no one can be logged in more than once (there's gotta be a plug-in for this).
Something of a MarketPress + Membership is beginning to make sense, though I have not played with Marketplace yet.
Going to play with it now.
C
Support Kangaroo — 3rd February 2012 21:18 #
Greetings Mark :-)
sir I tested out my proposal about modifying the download link to the url of the stream, and it worked to some degree - Indeed the link was encrypted, However it downloaded a picture of the entire video page, but the video itself was unusable. I used a Youtube URL as the stream.
So obviously this idea is a no go.
Next you were referring to plan B.
In this case something like this is what I would use for the link:
http://easyexpire.com/
so if they share it - it does not work.
We have definitely gotten beyond the scope of this plugins current purpose and features.
Therefore I can only now propose to make it a feature request to allow the selling of external links, encrypted, that expire by amount of downloads or time.
Joe :-)
Member — 4th February 2012 07:30 #
@Joe
Thanks for the submitting the feature request, Joe. Just a note: I personally don't need the link expiration feature because I want people to be able to return to the video page as often as they want. (I was just hoping there was a way they browser URL could be masked as well.) If adding such a feature would hold up implementing the feature request of selling external links, I'd prefer not to include it.
@Chris
If you want be people to be able to log in only once, then how is that any functionally different than setting up a "pay per view" service? I think there are established methods for that, but I don't think WPMUDev offers them.
Member — 4th February 2012 11:46 #
Well, I played around and unfortunately, Membership + MarketPress combined is not getting me closer to a solution (yet, anyhow!).
Mark, the option of creating "fake downloads" seems like more to manage than necessary.
I found a couple plug-ins from other developers that do what I need, though. Won't post their names as I want to keep the love here at WPMU. :-)
It's referred to as "pay per view" (for live events) and "video on demand" (for archives). Which works just as you expect from a cable TV provider, but on the Web. Essentially, customers who have purchased access are given a unique URL for a post with the embed on it. The system authenticates and allows access. If someone tries to access without authenticating, the page renders a notice with an option to purchase. The system will not allow more than one visitor with the same authentication credentials to access the site at the same time.
Additionally, the plugins I found allow the site owner to control how many times it can be downloaded, plus a host of other customization options.
The above solution would be very seamless. It seems WPMU's solutions are sooo close to being able to do this. So, I'm hoping we can figure this out without work-arounds, fake downloads, hiding content (except where appropriate of course), etc.
Thanks,
Chris
Member — 4th February 2012 12:26 #
Hi Chris, I don't think it's improper to mention other companies' products here if the reason you are mentioning them is for problem solving and not simply advertising. In fact, it probably helps the WPMU developers to know.
Since there is no private messaging function on this board (or not one that I know of), can you go ahead and specify the other WP plug-in you are using? Does it have a feature where it can limit the number of views (and I mean views, not downloads) for embedded video on demand? I'd be really interested in hearing about that.
Thanks,
Mark
Support Kangaroo — 4th February 2012 14:19 #
Greetings Chris and Mark :-)
Mark was absolutely correct telling that a solution for someone else's product is fine within reason.
Not only does it help solve or offer solutions to our members which is one of the main priorities, idea of, and functions of WPMU Dev - it can also give ideas to us as to what we could develop in the future to further meet and serve our clients needs that we do not already have.
After our deep discussions between us three and attempts to come up with an exclusive WPMU solution, it is obvious for this particular task regarding the vending and distribution of streaming video, that we do not at the moment have an easy turn key solution.
There could be a viable solution with our brand new built from the ground up Membership Plugin soon be released, but that remains to be seen within if it would specifically function for this video streaming niche.
So Chris if you have a good solution for this video streaming project, please do not hesitate to let us in on it :-)
Joe :-)
Member — 4th February 2012 17:51 #
Okay. No problem Joe and Mark!
Well, I have not tried it out yet as there is a cost and I'm still researching
this one has a lot of options and a demo site set up:
http://www.tipsandtricks-hq.com/development-center
This is another.
http://digitalaccesspass.com/
Not a fan of the marketing, but if it works... :-)
--
C
Member — 6th February 2012 08:03 #
This is the one that seems the most solid to me:
http://www.wordpress-ecommerce.com/how-to-create-a-pay-per-view-video-website-1297
Let us know how it goes...
Member — 6th February 2012 21:37 #
Right. This article uses the project from the first link I posted, WP eStore. Did anyone try this out?
Member — 9th February 2012 13:15 #
Joe, the problem I am running into now is that I can't seem to hide the MarketPress menus and product pages from people who have not registered as a paid Member yet. Currently, a visitor can purchase a product without being logged in as a Member.
Any ideas?
Member — 9th February 2012 13:31 #
Hmm .. well maybe I just found a solution:
1. Select "Yes" for Force Login under General Settings in Marketpress
2. Redirect /wp-login.php?registration=disabled to the main subscription page
Let me know if you foresee any issues with that. I think this is more preferable than trying to hide the MP content.
Member — 9th February 2012 13:59 #
I'm closing this thread since the main questions have been answered.
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