thank you for the advice, i think i'll write a script to run on the server to check the dates and disable them. i hadn't thought of that, i'm too deep into the thing right now. i'm not very good at this, still new. it's all the little things, like making the control boxes centered, or making a flash video play, etc. that are driving me insane. i had the basic site up in about two days, but the devil's in the details. it's not up yet, but i have about two weeks before he gets the videos done, so i have plenty of time. since it's going to basically be a subscription, i don't want to delete any accounts, they may want to renew later. i was thinking of the self-destruct more along the lines of disabling. maybe check the time on the downloaded machine and when 48 hours are up, it deletes a header or something. maybe i can write something and sell it to blockbuster or netflix, or you can have it if you want. it'll take me a year at this point to write it.