Bizzaro.'s guide to making your own download links

 One of the things I am pretty proficient at is finding ways to make various things, both physical and technological, do stuff it wasn't intended for. 

"Just like Michelangelo saw the angel in the stone, I look at a guy like Kevin Costner and see a giant peach grub who can fart the Blue Danube!" - Elijah C. Skuggs 

 Much like Karl Marx, I tend to believe the means of production should be in the hands of the people, at least when it comes to selling your own magic products. Obviously not everyone has that desire or ability but for those that do, here is a hot tip for all of you. 

 In an attempt to move into the modern age I decided to make a lot of my DVDs into downloadable videos. To do this I looked into various shopping cart software that wouldn't ding me left and right and that is when I found the company Vibralogix. They have a few code based programs and one of them is called "Vibracart Pro". 

One of the many things you can do with this program is send a download to someone in case something messes up or you just need to send a gift to someone. I realized that it generates a unique download code every time you do this. I realized I could use this to make download slips for my physical products that I sell in my lecture. It also lets me control how many times the download can be accessed and how long until it self destructs. When combined with something like a Tinyurl shortener, I can print out slips and even have QR codes. I made a video below to show you just how easy it is!

 Why is this important you ask? It adds another layer to prevent theft. Obviously once one person has it, they can send/give it to their friends and there isn't much you can do about that. However, this prevents them from just sharing the download link as if it was a password protected YT or Vimeo link. This adds an extra step which might deter some since it has a download limit. 

It will take some set-up but the manual is very robust and yes, they do have a Wordpress plugin to interface with the backend if you prefer that. The nice thing is you never have to implement the shopping cart anywhere if you just need the codes. (I've even used this shopping cart as a personal materials calculator for our escape room company on a private page)

There are places like Amazon that can also kind of do this, but you have to give them money and for a bit more effort, you get to retain control over everything.

If that's your kind of kink, then you might just like this set-up.