Josh Arnold
Entertainment manager, Best Buy

Josh Arnold, 29, has managed local buying at 120 Best Buy stores throughout the Southwest for titles passed on by the Best Buy central buying office in Richfield, Minn. But as his title suggests, Arnold is more than a buyer. He's coordinated high-profile, in-store appearances by artists throughout his region. Arnold says the chain lands the best in-stores, because "we have the ability to offer more than what the artists can get at our competitors." And since Arnold is based in Los Angeles, he has often served as the face of Best Buy in that entertainment capital. Although Best Buy, at press time, reported plans to phase out its eight entertainment manager positions nationwide, Arnold seems likely to take on another role at the chain. "It takes a special person to be able to support and manage the demands of corporate America and the entertainment industry," says Cyndi Bloom, former Best Buy director of entertainment, who nominated Arnold for the 30 Under 30 list. "Josh has proven a name for himself and is viewed by his peers as a reliable partner in many successful initiatives and promotions."

Josh Briggs
Director of membership for pop/rock, ASCAP

Josh Briggs, 28, plays a key role at ASCAP, from signing new songwriters to helping the organization set up its songwriting workshops, camps and conferences, including the annual Create Music EXPO. He moderates and participates in panels at various trade shows and seminars and also speaks at colleges about ASCAP. The artists, songwriters and producers that Briggs has signed to ASCAP include the Temper Trap, Fleet Foxes, Band of Horses, Fitz & the Tantrums, the Henry Clay People, Local Natives, Luke Walker, Christian TV, NeverShoutNever, the Entrance Band, Switch, Tim Anderson, Active Child and Drew Seeley. Briggs is also involved in the Art of Elysium's "Elysium Sessions" series, a charity venture that encourages artists and musicians to give lessons and workshops on how to write lyrics or play songs and donate time to children's hospitals.

Josh Builder
VP of product development and operations, the Orchard

Josh Builder, 29, joined the Orchard in 2006 and oversees product strategy, product technology design and content management and delivery. He played a key role in setting up the Orchard's mobile retail operation in Asia. That success led to an exclusive licensing and merchandising partnership with China Telecom. Closer to home, Builder helped build V.E.C.T.O.R., the Orchard's proprietary content ingestion system (allowing the upload of files) as well as its distribution infrastructure, which distributes more than 2 million music tracks and 5,000 hours of video content to more than 750 Internet and mobile retail outlets worldwide. The result: annual revenue of $62 million. "Building one of our industries' leading Internet and mobile content distribution networks is the achievement I am most proud of up to this point," he says. Builder also serves on the board of the Digital Data Exchange, an organization dedicated to developing and maintaining communications standards to support the digital distribution of content globally.

Ben Cockerham
CFO/chief strategy officer, RightsFlow

Music licensing and royalty payment service provider RightsFlow is a company on the move, led by co-founders Ben Cockerham, who acts as CFO/chief strategy officer, and Patrick Sullivan, who is president. It reported revenue that was up 405% in first-quarter 2010, compared with the same period of 2009, while the number of clients has grown from 1,500 to 10,000. Cockerham, 29, has guided the company into background music, international rights clearance and reporting, master clearance, mobile clearance and user-generated content clearance. As RightsFlow has grown, Cockerham has helped shape industry discussions of copyright in the digital age. A graduate of New York University's Stern School of Business, Cockerham met Sullivan at eMusic, where they conceived RightsFlow. "We thought there had to be a simpler way to license music and pay royalties," he says. "And, lo and behold, there was."

Karimah Day
President/COO, Sir Groovy

Karimah Day, 29, not only helped found the Sir Groovy music synch licensing company, she also collaborated on the software that allows TV, film, ad and game creators to search the firm's 12,000-song database to find the right music for their projects. Day had been a partner in the boutique investment firm Radical Funds in San Francisco when she and Radical's founder, Vic Sarjoo, co-launched Sir Groovy in beta form in October 2009. The site represents 300 labels in nonexclusive arrangements and soon will have their total repertoire of 50,000 songs in its database. Users can search using "sounds like" buttons, and Day says the software thinks like a music buyer. Day began her music career working at Roc-a-Fella in its Rocawear merchandising line. She says Sir Groovy's link to indie-label catalogs and ability to license masters as well as synch rights gives it an advantage over competitors. In the past 12 months, the company says, it has signed up clients including ABC, CBS, NBC, Viacom, Nickelodeon, MTV, Will Ferrell, ESPN, Malibu Rum, Amstel Light, AT&T, Young & Rubicam and Nintendo.

Priya Dewan
U.S. label manager, Warp Records

Globe trotter Priya Dewan, 28, an Indian citizen born in the Philippines and raised in Singapore, has helped take Warp Records from relative obscurity in the United States to a position as one of the leading indie tastemakers. "I am extremely proud and grateful to Steve Beckett, the owner of Warp, for trusting me in this position of running Warp's North American operation at such a young age and being given this great opportunity with all the responsibility it entails," she says. "My proudest moment in this position was definitely the No. 8 debut of Grizzly Bear's 'Veckatimest' on [the Billboard 200], as that was my first major commercial success as label manager and a first for Warp in the U.S." Dewan also helped negotiate two lucrative distribution deals for the label in the United States and Canada and hosted Warp20, a series of concerts and screenings celebrating the label's 20th anniversary. She is also an active member of the American Assn. of Independent Music and is expected to be elected to the organization's board in the near future.