MSN videos lock up after advertisement

Question

When I am watching a video on msn.com and then it pauses for an advertisement video after the advertisement is over it will not play the rest of the video. It locks up. What’s wrong and how do I fix it. I am using an apple iPad.

Answer 1

On MSN, video playback and monetization rely on the ad segment completing correctly and the main video being properly ingested and hosted. When the ad finishes and the main video “locks up,” the most likely causes are:

1. The video itself is failing to ingest or play correctly on MSN (for example, due to format or metadata issues on the publisher side).
2. The MSN player is having trouble resuming the main stream after the ad segment.

From the MSN side, videos must:

• Be in a supported format (MP4, AVI, WMV, M4V) with a valid extension.
• Be at least 10 seconds long and under 2 GB.
• Be properly hosted by MSN (1PP via MRSS or the Video Uploader Tool) to render in the MSN Player and on Watch.

If a video does not meet these requirements or fails ingestion, playback can break after the ad or not start at all.

On an iPad, the practical steps to try are:

1. Close the browser (or MSN app, if using one) completely and reopen it, then try the video again.
2. Clear the browser cache/cookies, then reload the page and replay the video.
3. Try another supported browser on the iPad to see if the issue is specific to one browser.
4. If the problem occurs only on certain videos, it is likely an ingestion or hosting issue on MSN’s side with those specific videos, not the iPad.

If the issue persists across multiple videos and browsers on the iPad, collect examples (video URLs, approximate time, and ad shown) and report the problem to MSN/MSN partner support so they can check the affected assets and ad playback on their side.

---

References:

• Troubleshoot MSN media, video, and inline embed errors
• Troubleshoot MSN video tools and monetization issues