If you’re using S3MV, and your videos play fine, but take between 30 seconds to a minute to actually start playing, then there is an issue with the encoding of the actual video file itself.

It’s not a problem with Amazon S3 or with the S3MediaVault plugin. It’s an issue with the file encoding that’s causing it to load slowly (but then plays correctly once loaded).

You need to use a program called HandBrake, a desktop tool that will allow you to optimize your file encoding for playing on the web.

And once you’ve done that, all of your videos will play just fine.

Another common misconception about the S3MV script, is, people asking…

I just installed the S3mv script. And I’m watching a video on my web site. I’m now able to do a view source, get the URL from the source, and view it in a different browser. Isn’t this a bug or security hole in the script?

Relax, it’s neither a bug nor a security hole.

When you first visit a page that contains the S3MediaVault embed code, the S3MV script connects to your Amazon S3 account using the security credentials you provided in the script configuration during setup, and then it retrieves a secure, expiring URL that will be alive for 15 minutes.

So once the video starts playing, the clock starts ticking down towards those 15 minutes. Which means, when you do a view-source, the URL you see is actually an expiring link that will expire in less than 15 minutes.

So if you take that link and view it in another browser, then sure, you will be able to view it until the link expires (which is 15 minutes from the first time the S3MV script received the URL from Amazon).

So if you visited the page at 11:00 AM, then the temporary link can be revisited any time until 11:15 AM.

Now another thing that throws a wrench into your understanding of how this works, is when browsers cache URL’s.

So let’s say now you want to test this link after 15 minutes, to make sure it doesn’t work. Now when you visit the same link say 2 hours later in the same browser in which you viewed it earlier, guess what: your browser has cached the temporary URL, and will start playing the video even after 2 hours, while you sit there and wonder why the expiring link hasn’t, well, expired!

So if you want to do a proper test, here’s what you should do…

1. Go to your blog page or post that has the S3MV script embed code. Note down the time. Let’s say it’s 11:00 AM. You’ll see the video start playing. Let’s say your default browser is Firefox.
2. Now do a view-source, copy the full URL, and try to go to it directly – it should work again – because it’s still within the 15 minute expiring window.
3. Make a note of the URL in notepad – or some text editor. Come back to this after say, 1/2 hour.
4. Now open a completely new browser (like Internet Explorer or Chrome) – something different from your primary browser that you used earlier.
5. Now try visiting that same URL in this new browser. You’ll see that it doesn’t work.

You can rest assured when we say that this script is use on thousands of web sites, and the security is rock-solid.

Now remember, that the S3MV embed codes will load the right video for anyone visiting your blog.

If you wish to further prevent un-authorized visitors from even visiting your blog page or post that contains the embed code, then you need our other script – DigitalAccessPass.com – to protect blog posts and pages from non-”members” (so to speak).

Feel free to comment below if you have any questions.

Please note that S3MediaVault is not a “true streaming” solution. Which means, it doesn’t stream videos in real time, but rather, plays the video by buffering the file as the viewer is watching the video – just like how web sites like YouTube play videos.And that’s the right way to do it, if you care about your viewers.

This means your viewers will be able to rewind, fast forward, even put the video on pause (especially for large videos), so that it keeps buffering in the background, and then come back and watch it later when it has fully “loaded” , so that they won’t experience any real-time buffering. This is very useful for viewers that don’t have fast internet connections.

What this also means, is that anyone who watches your video, can also use free, browser plugins (like DownloadHelper) that allow you to download a video that you’re watching in your browser. This is not a security breach. They are able to download it to their computer, only because they currently already have been given authorized access to the video/audio itself.

Please remember that anything that is accessible online – like audio, or video – can always be easily downloaded to the viewer’s desktop. There are many different ways in which you can download what you are viewing in your browser. The bottom-line is this: If a video or audio is accessible in a browser, it can easily be downloaded – or “recorded” using screen-capture solutions like Camtasia, or audio capturing solutions like Audacity), and then saved – to the viewer’s computer.

S3MediaVault makes sure no one can directly access your files from your S3 account, and can only get to it from your blog (on which the S3MediaVault script is installed).

Then combine it with the Page/Post protection of DigitalAccessPass (DAP),which can make sure only certain people (like paid members, or free but registered users) can access your blog post or page, where the S3MediaVault embed code is published.

Combine DAP + S3MediaVault, and you would have now completely locked down your content from any and every kind of un-authorized and illegal access.

So once someone has paid for your content (or registered for it), and are authorized users who have a right to view or hear that content, it’s ok that they get to download what they’re eligible for, to their computer, for offline use (like during their morning walk, or on the treadmill, or in their car, or when standing in line at the theme park!)

We don’t think it is a good idea for you to prevent your paying members from downloading your videos. After all, they’ve paid for it, and should be able to download it and watch it offline (like on their mobile device, ipad, iphone, etc).

In fact, the best membership sites that we’ve been a member of, offer the content in multiple ways: Download the videos in flash format (flv), download ipod/ipad version (mp4), download audio version of this video (mp3), download the transcript of the video (PDF), etc.

The more you make it easier for your members to consume your content, the more they will love being a member, and stay with you longer.

The Basics

The S3MediaVault script is now on use on more than 3,000+ web sites, in its current version. And it works on all of those web sites. So, if your video does not play, then there’s a 99.9999% chance that it has something to do with…

1. Improper use of the [s3mv] tags
2. Incorrectly entering the Amazon Public key, secret key or bucket name into the S3MV script settings
3. Incorrect file name (file name “CaSe” matters, no spaces in the file name)
4. Bucket name should be all lower case. Even one capital letter in the bucket name will not work.

That said, here are a few tips on what to look for, depending on your error.

“Object stream not found” error

This usually means that the file name or bucket name is wrong.

Bucket name should be all lower case. If you created it using a non-lowercase name at Amazon, then you must re-create a new folder with all lower-case letters.

So go to the page where you have the S3MV tags, do a “view source”, copy the the full URL, and try to access it directly via a browser. Like this…

http://yourbucketname.s3.amazonaws.com/yourfilename.ext

Eg., http://digitalaccesspass.s3.amazonaws.com/101110.mp4

If you try to access the file directly, it should either start playing in your computer’s default video player (like Windows media player or Quicktime or VLC). Or you should see an “Access Denied” error. Both these mean that your file name and bucket name settings in the S3MV script are correct.

If neither of the above two happens, then re-check (triple-check) the script settings, and make sure you’re copy/pasting directly from Amazon into the S3MV script settings.