Cary Sherman is the former Chairman and CEO of the

Recording Industry Association of America The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...

, an organization representing the nation’s major music labels. The trade group’s member companies are responsible for creating, manufacturing, or distributing approximately 85 percent of all legalized sound recordings sold in the United States.

Education

Sherman graduated from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

in 1968, and

Harvard Law School Harvard Law School (Harvard Law or HLS) is the law school of Harvard University, a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest continuously operating law school in the United States. Each class ...

in 1971.

RIAA

Sherman was hired as general counsel for RIAA in 1997. Throughout his tenure, Sherman has helped guide the industry’s efforts to facilitate new ways for fans to access music and to ensure that music creators are properly compensated as

streaming media Streaming media is multimedia that is delivered and consumed in a continuous manner from a source, with little or no intermediate storage in network elements. ''Streaming'' refers to the delivery method of content, rather than the content it ...

became the dominant format of the business. He was instrumental in the enactment of the

Digital Performance Right in Sound Recordings Act The Digital Performance Right in Sound Recordings Act of 1995 (DPRA) is a United States Copyright law that grants owners of a copyright in sound recordings an exclusive right “to perform the copyrighted work publicly by means of a digital au ...

in 1995, which along with his work on the

Digital Millennium Copyright Act The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a 1998 United States copyright law that implements two 1996 treaties of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It criminalizes production and dissemination of technology, devices, or s ...

in 1998, established a new right for artists and labels to be compensated by digital music services. That right has since become the core legal foundation obligating streaming services to pay royalties for their subscription services – services that have become th
primary catalyst for growth in the business
His work involved coordination and regulation of the industry's business, policy and legal objectives while his obligations remain primarily in technology, government affair issues, licensing and enforcement of rules and regulations. In 2010, Sherman helped the RIAA secure a $105 million settlement from

LimeWire LimeWire was a free software, free peer-to-peer file sharing client for Microsoft Windows, Windows, MacOS, Linux and Solaris OS, Solaris. Created by Mark Gorton in 2000, it was most prominently a tool used for the download and distribution of O ...

for copyright infringement. Sherman replaced

Mitch Bainwol Mitchell Burt Bainwol (born March 2, 1959) is an American lobbyist. He served as Chief Government Relations Officer of Ford Motor Company from 2019 to 2021 and president and CEO of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers from 2011 to 2019. Before ...

as CEO in August 2011. Sherman is a strong advocate of

SOPA Sopa or SOPA may refer to: * Sopa (tribe), an Albanian tribe of the Sharr Mountains * Lake Sopa, Albania * School of Performing Arts Seoul, an arts high school in Seoul, South Korea * Senior Officer Present Afloat, a term used in the U.S. Navy ...

and

PIPA The pipa, pípá, or p'i-p'a () is a traditional Chinese musical instrument, belonging to the plucked category of instruments. Sometimes called the "Chinese lute", the instrument has a pear-shaped wooden body with a varying number of frets rang ...

. Following the defeat of the bills in January 2012, Sherman penned an

op-ed An op-ed, short for "opposite the editorial page", is a written prose piece, typically published by a North-American newspaper or magazine, which expresses the opinion of an author usually not affiliated with the publication's editorial board. O ...

in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' critical of the bills' detractors and their motives. The opinion piece was criticized.

Personal life

An amateur musician and lyricist, he is a member of the Board of Levine Music in Washington, D.C., where he recently served as Chairman. Sherman also serves on the board of the

Anti-Defamation League The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), formerly known as the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, is an international Jewish non-governmental organization based in the United States specializing in civil rights law. It was founded in late Septe ...

, and has served on numerous other boards, including the Copyright Society, Washington Area Lawyers for the Arts, The Computer Law Association, The Computer Lawyer, and

BNA Records BNA Records, formerly known as BNA Entertainment, was a label group that shared ties with Arista Nashville and RCA Nashville from parent company Sony Music Nashville, which itself is a subsidiary of Sony Music Entertainment. Based in Nashville, T ...

' Patent, Trademark and Copyright Journal.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sherman, Cary Living people American lobbyists Copyright activists Cornell University alumni Harvard Law School alumni People from Bethesda, Maryland Lawyers from Washington, D.C. Year of birth missing (living people) American Jews