CD Baby
From WWR
CD Baby is an online record store based in Portland, Oregon that sells CDs by independent musicians. When you hear a song on Whole Wheat Radio the page may display a link to CD Baby so you can purchase the CD.
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What's in it for WWR?
WWR gets $1 for each CD (except the $5 Special Sale CDs) people buy that comes with the special tag /from/jkloss on the CD Baby URL. Since September, 2003 WWR listeners have bought 2,771 CDs from CD Baby generating a total of $2,784 in referral payments for WWR.
For example, if you want to buy the Barnburner CD by The Clumsy Lovers, the normal CD Baby URL would be: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oarfin41 but if you add /from/jkloss to the end of that making it http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oarfin41/from/jkloss then WWR gets $1 from the sale. The artist gets exactly what they would have gotten otherwise - it's CD Baby who is generous enough to pay $1 to WWR for the referal.
Most of the links on the WWR system have the /from/jkloss built in so you don't have to worry about it. Supposedly, if you go to CD Baby with /from/jkloss on the URL, if you buy any CDs within the next 24 hours, even if you close your browser and come back, WWR gets $1 for each CD. This is accomplished by the CD Baby site writing a cookie to your computer that says "if this computer buys something within the next 24 hours, give WWR $1 credit". If you don't have cookies enabled for the CD Baby site, the whole scheme falls apart.
What if WWR never gets credit for a CD I ordered?
There have been semi-frequent reports from listeners that they bought CDs from CD Baby, then checked the WWR What CDs listeners have bought from CD Baby page, but didn't see their CD purchase listed. We have spoken with Derek Sivers, the wonderfully cool guy that started and runs CD Baby, and he checked his end and reported no problems. Frankly, even though Jimbob believes that sometimes WWR doesn't get credit, he is so impressed with Derek Sivers personal philosophies and the way he runs his business that WWR has no intention of complaining. There are so many variables that can go wrong on the user's end that Jimbob is sympathetic to the technical hurdles Derek must overcome to record every sale.
On the other hand, if you are technically inclined and want to help, before you make your order on CD Baby, delete the CD Baby cookie. At every step of the ordering process, make a copy of the cookie and take a screen snapshot. Wait a few days and see if your order shows up on the WWR page. If it does not, gather all the cookies and screen snapshots and send them to Jimbob. He'll see what he can figure out. If we provide Derek with enough data at every step of the ordering process, he might be able to debug the problem and offer a solution.
One other techie tidbit if you are concerned about WWR getting credit for your purchase. Note that on the "title bar" (the blue bar at the very top of your browser page on Internet Explorer) you should see the words "from jkloss (from jkloss)" or something approximating that in the title itself. This is a very good indication that CD Baby has recognized your /from/jkloss on the URL. If you don't see "from jkloss" anywhere in the webpage's actual title but have /from/jkloss on the URL, you may want to keep reloading the browser or tinker with your cookies until you do see it. First person that documents having /from/jkloss on the URL and has cookies correctly configured but never sees "from jkloss" in the title wins ... a cookie!
About CD Baby
The following was copied from the "About" page of the CD Baby web site:
- [In•de•pen•dent: (adj.) Not having sold one's life, career, and creative works over to a corporation.]
- We're just a few people (details here) in a cool Portland, Oregon, CD warehouse that looks like a playground. We listen to every CD we sell before we sell it, so we can help you find other albums you'll like.
- We only sell CDs that come directly from the musicians. No distributors. Musicians send us CDs. We warehouse them, sell them to you, and pay the musicians directly.
- Cool thing: in a regular record deal or distribution deal, musicians only make $1-$2 per CD, if they ever get paid by their label. When selling through CD Baby, musicians make $6-$12 per CD, and get paid weekly.
- In business, and thriving, since March 1998. We're the largest seller of independent CDs on the web.
Ordering from CD Baby
When you purchase a CD from CD Baby, you'll get a hand-written email from Derek Silvers that describes what's going on. It may read something like this:
- Your CDs have been gently taken from our CD Baby shelves with sterilized contamination-free gloves and placed onto a satin pillow.
- A team of 50 employees inspected your CDs and polished them to make sure they were in the best possible condition before mailing.
- Our packing specialist from Japan lit a candle and a hush fell over the crowd as he put your CDs into the finest gold-lined box that money can buy.
- We all had a wonderful celebration afterwards and the whole party marched down the street to the post office where the entire town of Portland waved 'Bon Voyage!' to your package, on its way to you, in our private CD Baby jet on this day [insert date here].
- I hope you had a wonderful time shopping at CD Baby. We sure did. Your picture is on our wall as "Customer of the Year". We're all exhausted but can't wait for you to come back to CD BABY.COM!!
Oh yeah, and you almost always get an extra (free) CD with your order. Sometimes they're pretty good.
External links
Top 25 purchases by artist
| # | Artist | Qty / Amt |
| 1 | Kalai | 128 / $128 |
| 2 | Sara Thomsen | 107 / $107 |
| 3 | Joe Purdy | 79 / $79 |
| 4 | E.s. Posthumus | 72 / $72 |
| 5 | Acoustic Eidolon | 39 / $39 |
| 6 | Danny Schmidt | 32 / $32 |
| 7 | Paul Kamm And Eleanore MacDonald | 30 / $30 |
| 8 | Seamus Kennedy | 30 / $30 |
| 9 | Lisa Layne | 28 / $28 |
| 10 | Deb Talan | 26 / $26 |
| 11 | Sloan Wainwright | 24 / $24 |
| 12 | Dave Carter & Tracy Grammer | 23 / $23 |
| 13 | Johnsmith | 21 / $21 |
| 14 | Teena Marie | 21 / $21 |
| 15 | Doug Geeting | 19 / $19 |
| 16 | Esther Golton | 18 / $18 |
| 17 | Girlyman | 18 / $18 |
| 18 | The Quebe Sisters | 18 / $18 |
| 19 | Kacey Jones | 17 / $17 |
| 20 | 3 Blind Mice | 16 / $16 |
| 21 | Antje Duvekot | 16 / $16 |
| 22 | Christine Kane | 16 / $16 |
| 23 | Steve Durr | 15 / $15 |
| 24 | The Mammals | 15 / $15 |
| 25 | Harry Manx | 14 / $14 |
Here is a report showing all purchases by artist
Top 25 purchases by album
Here is a report showing all purchases by album
Last 100 CD Baby transactions
Here is a report showing all purchases summarized by month
Here is a report showing the details of all purchases
