membership single-item and past month package

I’ve a client that wants to create a video content site where she’s selling all of her videos; the way it would function would be like this:

1) a single video can be purchased for .99 (either ability to view that video in page or download file)

2) a membership to the site to view all the daily videos (only from the month of membership, not past months, more on this later)
2a) membership of 4.99 a month
2b) membership on a 6 month renewal 25.99
2c) membership of a yearly renewal. 49.99

Now the kicker is this:if I sign up for membership either at the beginning of March or the end of March, I have access to all of March’s videos and any videos going forward. However any months PRIOR to the month I became a member I have to purchase either as a one-off single video or I can purchase the package of a month’s videos.

My question then is this – my thoughts were obviously what membership levels would be needed (I’ve customized shopp a lot but this is my first foray into s2member).

Are the three different purchases of membership access 3 different members (believe so).
If someone is buying one-offs but not a member they would be Member 1 (and if members 2,3,4 once they cancel auto renewal they will default to member 1?)

If members 2,3,4 cancel renewal and default to level 1 will all of their previous purchases – either single one-offs or everything within the life of their membership — also be available to them as a degraded level 1?

Obviously as a member upon any post type load I can check to see if a) the viewer is a member and b) the start date of theiir membership. If they’re not a member or if they are a member prior to that video date I can show them the purchase single / purchase monthly options.

I’m not sure if there’s a ‘orders’/’items’ lookup that I can do as well — ie if one purchases a package of monthly items can I specify the single items they purchased (ie montly lookup) or so I have to create a page that is a montly listing that I sell access to?

This is going to take some explaining; and though I consider myself a very abled programmer I’m just having trouble getting my head around *how* I should set this up before I begin; so if you tell me ‘use the api to hide this and this to this user’ I’d be good to go; I’m just not sure if I set restrictions on pages, posts or leave them open and do the checking inline (starting to get that yes that’s what I’d do).

Actually – here’s what I’m thinking and any advice just to point me to code or tell me if my thinking is sound.

I’m going to just create a normal membership. Upon every post (I’ve created a custom post of ‘hh-videos’, hh being the client’s name. What I’m thinking I’m going to do is that upon every single video load I will — tell me if this is possible:

1) based upon every single of the video I’m going to get the post_id and pubdate; I wlll generate two custom capabilitiy buttons ont he fly of single_%post_id% and montly_%year%_%month%

2) I will first check to see if the user is a member.
2a) If the current post pubdate is later then his membership join I will show the video / download buttons
2b) if the current post date is prior to his membership date then…

3) I will check if the user has the single capability for that item (again single_%post_id%) — if so, video and download

4) if not I will check the monthly package – is the monthly capability his? if so, video/download, if not

Purchase single / purchase monthly buttons.

Is this doable?

Raam – tried contacting you via your website then got lost reading your journeys – also realized I’m very close to to you (central ct) so you’re enjoying the snow…

Anyway I’m reading this: http://www.primothemes.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=2599&p=7409&#p7409

and tell me if I’m wrong but the capabilities are just really a lookup table to some capacity; if I’m saving things that are dd_cap(‘access_s2member_ccap_postid_123’) – then in theory once I load in the single and have that single’s post id I can check if the user has that cap, correct? The same would go for in terms of finding a date and just checking if the current video’s pubdate is within a paid-for monthly capability…?

My only uncertainty is how to best deal with membership. At first I was thinking I’d redirect the /videos/ uri but that would mean that one would have to already be a member in order to purchase singles or monthly access; I think instead if I’m correct about the above, could I not have a button that says ‘become a member!’, take them to the purchasing for that membership and upon return I can hide the ‘join’ button by seeing if the membership capability is already in there; as well as checking said users’ membership date.

The only other thing I’d be concerned about is that I’ve read when a user downgrades when they cancel they lose all their capabilies; we want to allow the user access to vids they purchased as a single, as a monthly package, and all the videos that existed during the months of their membership (I need to confirm but I do think it’s easy chunkage, ie if I cancel my membership on 3/3 I get all the videos of March) – I’m thinking upon the downgrade I just save old member data (capabilities) to my own table and also use that to lookup – ie userid for past caps?

Thanks for putting up with me.

Hi Garry.

If I understood correctly, what you want is to sell videos individually (one-time payment, lifetime access) or in a membership (montly payment, access ends with subscription cancellation).

You can sell the custom capabilities individually if they’re a one-time (buy now) payment. [hilite path]Dashboard -› s2Member® -› PayPal® Pro Forms -› Capability (Buy Now) Forms[/hilite]

Set the Auto EOT Behavior to not remove custom capabilities on demotion when a subscription ends. [hilite path]Dashboard -› s2Member® -› PayPal® Options -› Automatic EOT Behavior -> Remove all Custom Capabilities[/hilite]

Don’t protect the video pages with a custom capability or level restriction, since you want to use both and s2Member will expect the user to have both to give access, not just one of them. Instead, in the page’s content, use conditionals with the OR condition for the ccap or level you require. [hilite path]Dashboard -› s2Member® -› API / Scripting -› Advanced PHP Conditionals[/hilite]

These conditionals would also need to take into account the subscription time to drip the access. [hilite path]Dashboard -› s2Member® -› API / Scripting -› Content Dripping[/hilite]

The link to the protected videos, since they may be accessed by one with a level or ccap, will need to have a download key. [hilite path]Dashboard -› s2Member® -› Download Options -› Advanced Download Restrictions[/hilite]

I hope that helps. :)

Thanks Cristián – we got a lot of it done and working, however one thing — if someone comes in and tries to purchase custom capabilities without first registering it seem to throw an error as it can’t find the user that purchased it – and that makes sense to me. So we need to get people to register before purchasing… so thinking of restricting the videos url and forcing free reg before purchases are made…?

Right. Capabilities can only be added to a user account.

If you’re using the capability pro-form, I’m pretty sure it works as a registration form when the person isn’t logged in, like the level pro-forms do. But if the person is already registered, you should have him login first so the capability he’s purchasing gets added to that account and not a new one.