Shawn Bayern

Timeline

1. 1999

   Yale, CAS and JSTL

   He graduates from Yale with a B.S. in 1999. As a researcher in Yale's Technology and Planning group, he develops the Central Authentication Service, and he is the reference-implementation lead for JSTL. In the early 2000s, he also creates a machine-learning system that plays rock-paper-scissors against human opponents.

2. 2006

   A J.D. from Berkeley Law

   He earns a J.D. at the University of California, Berkeley, in 2006. As a law student, he is editor-in-chief of the California Law Review and a recipient of the Thelen Marrin Prize for Academic Achievement.

3. 2014

   The zero-member LLC

   In 2014, he publishes "Of Bitcoins, Independently Wealthy Software, and the Zero-Member LLC" in the Northwestern University Law Review. He argues that a single-member LLC can become a zero-member LLC, after which software can govern the entity.

4. 2017

   Elected to the American Law Institute

   He is elected to the American Law Institute in 2017. He serves as adviser to the Restatement (Third) of Torts: Miscellaneous Provisions and the Restatement (Third) of Torts: Medical Malpractice.

5. 2019–2023

   Autonomous entities under US law

   He serves as associate dean for academic affairs at Florida State from 2019 to 2023. In November 2019, he writes in the Oxford Business Law Blog that software and other artificial systems can enter contracts, own property, sue, and be sued through LLC law.

6. 2021

   The book Autonomous Organizations

   In October 2021, Cambridge University Press publishes Autonomous Organizations, which shows that business law already allows software systems of any kind to receive legal personhood or a very close surrogate of it. In a Cambridge Q&A, he notes that Vermont and Wyoming have passed statutes that serve almost as safe harbors for his techniques.

7. 2022–2023

   AI essays and a law book

   In 2022, he publishes "Adventures with an Artificially Intelligent Language Model (and What It Might Say About the Law)" in Green Bag 2d. In 2023, Cambridge University Press publishes his book The Analytical Failures of Law and Economics, which surveys leading law-and-economics arguments and shows them to be fragile, self-contradictory, or otherwise problematic.

8. As of October 2026

   Associate Dean for Technology

   His 2024 publications include Advanced Introduction to Business Organizations (Edward Elgar). He is Associate Dean for Technology and Larry & Joyce Beltz Professor of Torts at Florida State University College of Law.