diff --git a/djangoapps/courseware/content_parser.py b/djangoapps/courseware/content_parser.py
index dbd3befae8..d557e5ac36 100644
--- a/djangoapps/courseware/content_parser.py
+++ b/djangoapps/courseware/content_parser.py
@@ -118,7 +118,7 @@ def id_tag(course):
             new_id = default_ids[elem.tag] + new_id
             elem.set('id', new_id)
         else:
-            elem.set('id', fasthash(etree.tostring(elem)))
+            elem.set('id', "id"+fasthash(etree.tostring(elem)))
             
 def propogate_downward_tag(element, attribute_name, parent_attribute = None):
     ''' This call is to pass down an attribute to all children. If an element
diff --git a/lib/util/memcache.py b/lib/util/memcache.py
index 7af5581406..3da65a1b51 100644
--- a/lib/util/memcache.py
+++ b/lib/util/memcache.py
@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@ import urllib
 def fasthash(string):
     m = hashlib.new("md4")
     m.update(string)
-    return "id"+m.hexdigest()
+    return m.hexdigest()
 
 def safe_key(key, key_prefix, version):
     safe_key = urllib.quote_plus(smart_str(key))