MindBites FAQ

There are two parts to MindBites - our video marketplace and our platform offerings.  If you're just getting started and are looking for a way to sell access to your video content online, the marketplace is for you.  You can upload, price, configure and sell access to any instructional video content you upload there.  It's easy and free to get started, and we'll help you out along the way.  

If you already have a web presence but don't want to spend the time and energy and money required to build out a way to sell access to videos there, our platform options are for you.  With the MindBites platform, you can create a custom video-on-demand store to sell access to your videos.  It's easy to bolt your store onto your existing site, and the beauty of a MindBites custom store is that you get virtually all of the features of MindBites without having to direct people to the MindBites marketplace, where there's obviously MindBites branding and potentially even competing products.  Instead, you control all elements of the store and users who purchase access then return to your site and store to login and view their purchases.  

There are two communities that rely on MindBites - our users (who buy access to videos they find on the site or on a MindBites custom store) and our authors (content partners who sell access to their videos through our marketplace or a MindBites-powered custom store).

For users, MindBites is pretty simple - they land on a product page (either a 'lesson' page or a 'series' page - the former is a page where they'll buy access to a single video and the latter is a page where they can buy access to a bundle of videos).  On the product page, users can preview videos, read ratings & reviews, learn about the creator of the video, etc.  When they decide to purchase a video, they walk through a quick and easy checkout process and submit either PayPal or credit card payment information.  After the purchase is complete, they immediately get access to watch the full version of video(s) they purchased.  And, if the author allows it, they can download a copy of their video for use offline.  Further, if the author has provided supplementary file attachments, they'll be able to view and download these files once they've purchased access to the video.

For authors, MindBites is also simple.  Once you're signed up as an author, you'll have an 'Author Dashboard' that is your control panel for the site. That's where you'll go to upload content, customize content, monitor and track various content success metrics, check your earning amounts, request a payout, etc.  You'll start out by uploading a video.  Once you have it uploaded, you can customize all sorts of different attributes for it, including its title, description, thumbnail, price point, category, etc.  Plus, you can upload optional supplementary files (that will only then be available for viewing or downloading when the lesson is purchased) and you can define different access constraints (e.g. stipulate that purchase only enables access for a defined amount of time or stipulate that content not be offered as a downloadable file to purchasers).  Once you've customized your lesson, you'll hit publish, and it'll appear in the MindBites marketplace.  If you've set up a custom store, you can also then add it to your custom store. 

Nada. It's free to register with MindBites. This will allow you to participate in community forums, gain access to free lessons and promotional offers, explore our extensive instructional catalog and watch lesson previews at your leisure.  Plus, you can even start uploading and selling access to your videos for free.

For authors, posting on MindBites is completely free of charge at the basic level AND for each lesson sold, you'll earn 65% of the lesson price after a $0.29 transaction fee. We know, you don't have to thank us.  If you're looking to sell access to your videos through the MindBites marketplace as well as a MindBites-powered custom store that you can easily integrate into your own site, then platform options start at $14 per month and come with commission payouts on custom store sales that go up to 75% after a $0.29 transaction fee.

Beats us! That's up to you, the authors. You see, unlike most other video "how to" sites, the content on our site isn't picked out by a handful of people in our main office (who, while they do have a broad range of interests and talents, simply cannot begin to imagine everything the world out there wants to learn). Instead, anyone, from anywhere, can add to our catalog (or catalogue for you educated types). The result is some pretty interesting and unique material, to say the least!  You'll find everything on MindBites from Economics video tutorials and lessons to Self-Defense and Martial Arts Videos to video lectures and online homework help for Algebra to health and fitness videos to get you in shape with weights or yoga or pilates and even help you tune up your treadmill or bike.

However, we do stress that MindBites is focused on instructional content, i.e. lessons that inform the viewer on how to do something.  What you will certainly NOT find on MindBites is content solely for entertainment or pornography; we feel that the internet is saturated enough with this type of content, so users interested in such will hardly be left wanting. In any case, if you think you've come across something inappropriate, please flag it as such.

If you click on the Contact Us link at the bottom of any page (or here), you can send a message to our team.

Anyone. We firmly believe that everyone has something valuable to contribute, and as the world becomes more connected and technology proliferates, sharing your knowledge has never been easier. Authors include professional instructors, life-long hobbyists, businesses, DVD creators, and yes, even you (please poke yourself in the chest for us).

While MindBites is free at the Basic level, MindBites Authors can choose from four additional “platform” levels depending on what they are trying to accomplish with the MindBites platform and what advanced features and functionalities they would like to leverage. Click here for a full breakdown of the different levels and the different features they offer.

Think a custom Enterprise option is what you’re going to need? Contact us or check out our MindBites Solutions offerings.  We'd love to work with you to come up with something perfect!

Absolutely. We call this feature a “Custom Store” and it is available under the “Pro” platform level and above (see previous question for explanation of platform levels). A MindBites Custom Store can be fully customized to match the look and feel of your site and provides the functionality for your users to preview, purchase and view your MindBites lessons without ever leaving your website. Great, right?!?

Of course!  Custom stores are one of the most amazing features of MindBites.  Checking out a couple should give you a feel for how they can be customized to look, how they are generally laid out, how they operate, and how different content partners integrate them into their websites.  Here are some recent ones to get you a feel for how amazing they are:

Brent Mayne's Art of Catching Video Store,
Professor Burger's Math Lesson Video Store,
Tezoro Production's On-Demand Video Store for their Dance DVD Library,
Edge Disc Golf's Video Instruction Store,
Understand Blue's store for Paper Arts Instruction,  

Think this may be what you want but have some questions?  Contact us, and we'll be happy to mock up a quick draft of a custom store for your site. Make sure to let us know what your URL is when you email us!  This is often the easiest way for people to really get a feel for how a custom store might look and feel when set up to look and feel like (and integrate into) their existing website.

MindBites operates on a credit system. Credits cost $0.99 to buy, and all products on MindBites are priced in terms of credits (by the author of the product). If you have questions about how you should price your lessons and series, we’re happy to give you our thoughts (Contact us), but setting the price is completely up to you. And, it should be noted, that you can change up your pricing at anytime.

Each time one of your lessons or series is sold through MindBites, you will earn between 65-75% of the lesson price after a fixed $0.29 transaction fee. The payout percentage is tied to your Author Platform level (Click here for more on Author Platform Levels) and the channel through which the sale was made (65% on sales through the MindBites marketplace and more for sales through your custom store).

Once you have generated at least $25 in earnings, a ‘Request Payment’ link will appear at the top of your Author Dashboard. To get paid, you’ll simply need to click that. Then, voila! Within 7 business days (and usually much sooner), you will receive payment through PayPal sent to the email address on your author account. When you're first getting started (before you become our best friend), we'll have to hold onto your funds for 30 business days after your initial payout request to ensure that you're not a fraudster. Please note there are two earnings values on your Author Dashboard. The "Available" earnings indicates the amount of earnings currently eligible for payout and this is the amount that must be over $25. The "Total" earnings is an indication of your lifetime earnings.

MindBites accepts media files for upload in the following formats: (.MOV, .MP4, .AVI, .WMV, .M4V, and .FLV).

The optimal format for uploading files to Mindbites is an MP4 or Quicktime file compressed with the h.264 codec or a Windows Media file compressed with Windows Media Video 9. The recommended resolution is 640x480. A bitrate of 1.5 to 2 megabit should provide the best quality.

While we feel compelled to give a specific optimal resolution for those looking for good export/compression settings to select, rest assured that the site can and does handle many variations on this (for those of you with content that's already been created or exported using different settings).  In addition to 4X3 footage, the site is equally adept at handling 16X9 footage.  Other resolutions can also be accommodated with shadowboxes, and screencasted content is processed such that it can be made available to users in its native resolution.  Further, higher and lower bit rates are certainly acceptable and may well be desired depending upon the nature of your content and footage.

The video file size limit and maximum number of lessons you can have for sale in the MindBites marketplace is determined by your Author Platform level. There is no limit on how long individual lessons can be, but the individual lesson file size limitations do effectively limit this at some level.

Bandwidth costs are covered by MindBites as are payment processing costs. Obviously bandwidth costs scale upwards with higher sales volumes, so we keep a percentage of your generated revenue to cover these sorts of costs.  This fixed percentage is determined by the MindBites author platform level at which you are subscribed.  Thus, if you're not actually selling many videos and thus are using very little bandwidth, you won't have to be shelling out to cover the costs of the bandwidth that you aren't using but may one day need.  And, most importantly, you won't ever be surprised by a hefty bandwidth overage bill from us!

Yes, please upload any supplementary materials that you think would aid in the user's experience. These materials can be in the form of MP3s, text documents, pictures, graphs, etc. Supplementary file names will be listed on the lesson page so prospective buyers know they’re included with the lesson purchase, but the files themselves will only be available to be viewed or downloaded by users who purchase your lesson.

All of these lesson attributes can be changed on the lesson edit page. The lesson edit page for any individual lesson can be accessed from your Author Dashboard by selecting “Manage Content” on the left-hand navigation and then the pencil icon (under the “edit” column) next to the lesson you wish to change.

If the lesson you’re looking for doesn’t show on the first page of product listed under “Manage Content”, you can search for it using the search box at the bottom of this first page of product listings.

Think of MindBites Series like iTunes albums. Just like artists on iTunes can sell individual tracks or full albums, you can sell individual lessons or series on MindBites. And, just like it usually costs less to buy an album on iTunes than to purchase all of the included songs a la carte, it also usually costs less as a user to buy a series than to buy all of the lessons included in that series separately.

If you have multiple (published) lessons that are loosely related, we’d encourage you to create a series out of them. Series are great for you because they encourage users to upsell to a higher-priced product, and when users buy a series, they do it in a single transaction (which means only one $0.29 transaction fee instead of one transaction fee per lesson if they buy a la carte). Any lesson that you include in one or more series will have each of those series listed and linked to from the description section of its lesson page. Hence, you don’t even have to work to tell users about the series – we do that part for you!

You can create series from your Author Dashboard. You’ll simply have drag and drop to select and order the lessons you want included in the series and input a title, description and price for the series.

At the Business level and above (see MindBites Platform Levels here), authors can designate that their lessons only be available to be viewed streaming online. If the author elects to do this, no downloadable version will be offered to users who purchase the lesson.

Unfortunately, there are no perfect solutions available that will allow lessons to be viewable by users but still protected. Even video content that is only available to be watched online can be illegally screencasted or ripped just as easily as a DVD can be. Hence, while we’d love to promise that we could protect your content from illegal copying and sharing, we cannot. That said, we do keep our eyes peeled for suspicious activity, and from a legal standpoint, the terms and conditions are abundantly clear on the fact that lessons purchased through MindBites are available to be viewed only for personal use by the individual who made the purchase.

You retain all ownership rights to your work and can remove any or all of it at any time. By posting a lesson on our site, you are simply giving us the right to non-exclusively sell, promote, and distribute your work. To have your lessons removed, please email us at support (at) mindbites dot com. We will remove your lessons from the marketplace promptly. The files will, however, be maintained on our servers and available for those who have purchased your lesson.

To have a lesson removed, please email us at support (at) mindbites dot com. We will remove your lessons from the marketplace promptly. We have you contact us such that we can ensure proper communication with anyone who has purchased access to the lesson that you would like to remove. If someone has purchased access to it, we will deactivate it initially. While deactivated, those who have purchased access will continue to be able to watch it but no other users will be able to preview or purchase access to it. We'll notify those that have purchase it that they have 30 days to watch the video before it will no longer be available. Once those 30 days are up, we'll delete your lesson. Once deleted, no one will have access to preview, purchase or watch it.

By all means, share your lesson as much as you can. We have tools built into the player and site that make it easy to email a link to your lesson or add a link to it on another site. Additionally, you can embed a player on your own webpage, blog or other site; this means that the preview of your lesson will be viewable in that player (and a button will show up at the end of the lesson preview to direct people to your lesson page to purchase the full lesson).

While MindBites does work hard to promote lessons on the site, we're admittedly a pretty small team that's spread pretty thin. Our most successful authors are those that use keyword-rich lesson titles, write lengthy and robust descriptions, and spend time driving web traffic to their own lessons (through other sites or blogs or links dropped elsewhere online). For more tips on promoting your lessons, check out our blog post series on Marketing your MindBites, starting with Part 1.

To track your page views, sales, earnings and sales conversion rate (sales/views), click on the “Analyze Activity” link from your Author Dashboard.

Don't see your question? Ask us here.

If we add it to the list, we'll credit you for your brilliance!

The price of each lesson and series on the site is set by the author of that product. Authors price their video products in increments of $0.99, which, conveniently, is the cost to purchase a single credit.  Where a 'lesson' is MindBites-speak for a single video, a 'series' is MindBites speak for a bundle of lessons that are purchased together.

Well, you don't for sure. While some MindBites videos are professionally produced and broadcast-quality, others are made by everyday people. Some are going to be brilliant and exactly what you wanted, others not so much. We do our part to ensure your satisfaction by giving you the ability to preview the lesson and look through the ratings and reviews of others who have already purchased it. If you're lucky enough to find a lemon, our apologies. In this case, please be sure to leave feedback warning others not to make the same mistake. Additionally, if the preview just didn't accurately set your expectations and you're unhappy with your purchase, please contact us. We'd love to make amends and definitely want everyone to be happy with their experience. To that end, please check out our unconditional guarantee lower on this page.

Generally speaking, you have two options. You can either watch the lesson streamed online (viewed in your browser as a flash video), or you can download the lesson to your computer (where you can watch it with most common media players or transfer it to your iPod, iPhone, etc). While these options are both available for most lessons, there are exceptions. In the case where an author is uncomfortable allowing downloads of the lesson media, the lesson will only be available to be watched streaming online. We'll be sure to let you know if this is the case in the text of the lesson description.

To get technical, MindBites transcodes your uploaded media file to create 4 different files - two are preview length and two are full-length.  Within each pair, we create an FLV version, which is generally streamed in traditional browsers.  We also create an MP4 version, which we stream to iPhone and iPad devices (and make available for downloading by purchasers, unless downloading is disabled on the lesson.

Well, that depends on the device. As iPods have become the most common in this market, MindBites has standardized all its video instructionals for ease of use with iTunes and iPod/iPhone transfers. In fact, once downloaded, you merely need to open the video in iTunes, import the file (if it didn't automatically), ensure that your iPod/iPhone is set to synch this video and you're ready to rock and roll.

Though MindBites lessons are generally asked to be compressed into iPod-ready formats, this does not mean they are incompatible with other portable media devices. Actually, most will accept the formats as readily as an iPod and with as much simplicity. If this is not the case, however, there are a myriad of free programs out there that should be able to convert the media for your device with minimal hassle and complications.

Well, how the heck should we know? It's your computer. OK, we're just kidding. We download stuff and lose it all the time. Since we don't make you download and install yet another piece of software to compete with iTunes, Windows Media Player, Real player, etc. etc., the media files are downloaded to your machine just like any other file you download from the Internet. We suggest creating a MindBites folder either on your desktop or some other easily locatable place where you can keep all your lessons together and organized. You should be able to search your machine to find ones you've already downloaded. Another way is to launch your media player once you've watched your lesson, and look under recent items to pull it up. Failing that, you can always return to the lesson page on our site to download it again.

Some authors provide supplementary files along with their videos. If a video does come with supplementary file attachments, they will be listed below the lesson description on the lesson page. They will be available to be viewed and downloaded once you purchase access to the video.

In most cases, you have forever. The most notable exceptions come at the behest of a lesson's author. First, if an author specifies that the lesson is only to be available online (streaming in your browser), you're obviously not going to be able to download it. To check to see what the author allows for a specific video, look for the 'Use' indicated under the 'About this Lesson' section on the lesson page. If a lesson will not be downloadable when purchased, it will say, "Watch Online."  Second, authors are also at liberty to stipulate an access period.  If a lesson has an access period constraint, this will also be listed under the 'About this Lesson' section.  For lessons with an access period, the time period will begin at purchase and you will continue to have access to the full version of the lesson until that period ends.  Last, if an author chooses to remove lessons they have posted on the site, we will notify users who have purchased these lessons to let them know that they will be unavailable on the site after a prescribed date. In this instance, you will be notified 30 days in advance of the lessons disappearing and no longer being available on the site.

While we at MindBites hope and strive to encourage a community of proper and quality content, we cannot offer any assurance as to the caliber of the lessons or the accuracy of the instructions they contain. Please use your own judgment and any available information when both selecting a video for purchase, and when utilizing any techniques demonstrated. And for goodness sake, be careful!

If you feel that there has been a technical error with your purchase, please contact us. If you believe that the original file the author uploaded was faulty, again, please contact us. We will contact the author and try to resolve the issue. If you can play the file, but you think the content is poor, we understand and sympathize with your feelings so please rate the material and write a review accordingly such that your opinion can be shared with others. It's important to us that you're happy with your purchase, though. So, in addition to your review, please let us know. We'll promise to make it right with you (see Satisfaction Guarantee question below).

While we obviously don't control the content posted on MindBites, we still want you to be happy with anything you purchase. To that end, we offer a satisfaction guarantee. If you're unhappy with a purchase, we'll be happy to remove it from your account (provided you haven't already downloaded it) and either credit your account or refund your money. The only catch on this is that we ask that you do your due diligence before purchasing (watch the lesson preview, check out the length of the lesson as well as its ratings and review) and before downloading (watch the lesson online to make sure you're content with it). These capabilities are there to protect you and help you to avoid the heartbreak of a disappointing purchase. Additionally, please don't forget that you are part of a community. If you're either happy or unhappy (or even moderately ambivalent) with a purchase, please help inform other members of the community by leaving a constructive and honest review and a rating of the lesson.

In some cases, this may have been because your payment source declined the charge. This happens for any number of reasons - often because your card is expired or something else has changed. We also periodically go through and cancel credit subscriptions on any account that has accrued a balance of more than 200 credits. The most expensive things in the MindBites marketplace are priced around that point, so we try to periodically cancel subscriptions that have accrued credit balances in excess of that amount. If you're saving up for some products in particular and don't want us to cancel your subscription, let us know. Or, if your subscription has already been canceled by our teams, you can easily reactivate it by running through a purchase and signing up for an additional subscription..

We respect people’s ability to protect and control the product of their hard work through copyright and other protections. Please don’t steal. MindBites authors are just like you, and they’ve worked very hard to prepare their lessons.

Unless otherwise noted, all lessons previewed or purchased on this site are the copyrighted material of their respective owners, and may be used only for your personal and non-commercial use. In certain instances, authors may specify materials as having Creative Commons Licenses, which may allow the creation of derivative works for non-commercial or commercial use. Please see individual lessons for details on any non-standard copyrights and refer to the Creative Commons site at www.creativecommons.org for more details.

If you suspect there is someone on the MindBites site who is violating another’s copyrights, please either flag the material as inappropriate or email us at info (at) mindbites dot com. Seriously, we joke about a lot of stuff around here, but we're serious about copyrights. We're completely serial.

The MindBites community is built on trust, connecting real people who want to learn with those who want to share what they know. The lesson files that you download will not have any technical restrictions that will prevent you from copying and moving the file to different devices for your personal use. We believe this is important since you may need your files on your iPod, your TV, your laptop or all of the above. Please do not abuse this ability by sharing files with people who have not paid for it. Our authors have worked hard to create these lessons! Please don’t steal! As an author, if you are simply too uncomfortable with the idea to allow users who have purchased your lessons to download them, we can certainly work around this. Contact us, and we can arrange for your lessons to only be available streamed online after purchase.

As with most sites, we need to collect some personal information to register you as a user and allow you to purchase materials. We are serious about privacy protection and will not share your information. For more details, please see our Privacy Policy [link]As with most sites, we need to collect some personal information to register you as a user and allow you to purchase materials. We are serious about privacy protection and will not share your information. For more details, please see our 'Privacy Policy'.

To see the lessons on the site you need to have a recent version of the Flash plugin installed. We recommend Flash 9, although you should be able to get by with Flash 8 if you already have it installed (some features may not be visible, so upgrade if you can).

The easiest option will be to watch your purchased videos online. Simply login and go to the lesson page (where you downloaded the lesson), and you'll be served the full length version of the video when you hit play. The system recognizes when a purchaser is logged in and will serve the full-length version instead of the abbreviated preview version that you were able to watch before purchasing access.

Alternatively, check to see if you have another video player installed - either iTunes or QuickTime or another one? You should be able to check pretty easily on a PC by right-clicking on the downloaded video file and selecting ‘Open With’ from the drop-down menu. This should show you a list of applications that your computer views as video players.

If not, the easiest way to watch the videos will be to install one of those. They’re both free (Quicktime can be downloaded here and iTunes can be downloaded here) and work pretty well. iTunes obviously comes with the iTunes store & whatnot built into it, so Quicktime may be a slimmer application for you.

If you’re limited on installing other applications or would prefer to stick with Windows Media Player, you’ll have to look for a ‘Codec Package’ to add into Windows Media Player in order to get it to support MP4 files appropriately.  Here are some instructions on installing new codecs for Windows Media Player in order to play MP4 files, which are the most common format for downloadable web videos.

MindBites has a satisfaction guarantee on all products that are sold through the site. A purchaser has 30 days to come back to us, express their discontent and receive a refund. Hence, we wait until this period has elapsed to pay out our affiliates per the terms of the MindBites Associates Program.

Simply follow this link, and fill out the quick form to apply. Simple as that.

Pretty much. A MindBites Associate is eligible to promote and earn commission on any lesson available on MindBites. The notable exceptions are that MindBites Authors are not eligible to sell their own lessons and earn commissions through the Associates Program, and you can’t earn commissions through the Associates Program on purchases you make for yourself, your friends or family, etc.

We certainly will. We offer an assortment of banners, widgets, and players to use in order for you to be as successful as possible as a MindBites Associate. Or, if it’s easier, you can just add text links to any page on the MindBites site with your Associate Code tacked onto the end. Check out this page for more information.

Once you reach $25 of available earnings (earnings from a sale become available 30 days following a purchase presuming there is no return), you can request payment via your MindBites Associate tab. Payment will be made via PayPal within 7 days to the email address associated with your account. In the event that you earn more than $500 in one calendar year, MindBites will require you to provide to us your Social Security number or other tax identification number for tax reporting purposes. Your social security number or tax identification number shall be used only for tax reporting purposes and not otherwise disclosed to any third party.

Payouts are made through a PayPal account to the email address associated with your account. Don't have a PayPal account? Sign up for one now!

No, silly. That is crazy talk. You CAN, however, tell all of your friends about your lessons and how THEY can make money selling your lessons on their site through the Associate Program.

It is actually quite simple, and we have provided a full explanation of the process on our MindBites Associate page, which you can access once you sign up to be an Associate.

I am glad you asked: Annual Earnings Threshold: $0 - $100 = 12% commission $100-$250 = 15% commission $250-$500 = 17% commission $500+ = 20% commission

In the MindBites Associate program your commission percentage is based on your accumulated earnings (not the accumulated revenue you generate). Once your total earnings reach a certain amount you move into the next threshold and therefore make a higher commission percentage. Let’s look at a fun example: Bob is a member of the MindBites Associate Program (clearly Bob is one smart fellow). Bob generates $700 in sales and, thus, for selling $700 worth of Product Revenue, he will earn 12% of $700 or $84. Once his earnings exceed a listed threshold (e.g. at $834 of annual gross product revenue sold, he will have earned more than $100), his subsequent sales will be compensated at the next threshold listed until it, too, is surpassed. Go Bob!

Sure are. At the end of each calendar year all Associate’s accumulated earning will be set to zero. But, guess what? Since we are launching the program towards the end of 2009, all earnings accumulated in 2009 will carry over into 2010.

You may not purchase products during sessions initiated through your own Associates links, and you will not receive referral fees for such orders. This includes orders to be used by you, your friends, your relatives, or your associates, in any manner.