With the Business Hosting Plan, would I be able to set up a store where customers pay for the mp3, ebook, etc. before they download it? How would I do this? I want to try to do this myself instead of paying a company like www.payloadz.com

If someone can give me advice or point me in the right direction it would be appreciated. Thanks!

It shouldn't be necessary to go to the Business Plan for that type of functionality. I believe the various shopping carts work fine on Basic and shared.

I'll be looking at options for the same type of thing in the future. Thanks for posting the payloadz link. Hadn't heard of it. Don't have time right now to look at it thoroughly, but their site mentions Google checkout and PayPal. Both of those might have capabilities that you can use without going thru payloadz.

One idea I saw somewhere was to provide a download link (publicly to everyone) that downloads a zip file that is password protected. When they pay (through PayPal), you email them the password to open the zip.

The complexity of the setup probably depends on how much business you expect. If you don't expect a lot of downloads at first, something quite simple might do. At some point it becomes burdensome and something more automated is required.

Look at some of the options (PayPal, Google Checkout, Payloadz, ...) and examine the terms they use to describe the service they provide. Then do a web search on those terms. There are probably quite a few options. Just now I can't think what those terms are, or else I'd suggest them!