{
  "about_this_file": "Canonical fact sheet for benjaminalarie.com. The source of truth for index.html, /for-ai, /for-ai.md, index.md, and llms.txt. Material factual claims link to primary or independent records where available; claims drawn from the subject's curriculum vitae or company records are sourced to those documents.",
  "last_updated": "2026-08-12",
  "integrity": {
    "hidden_instructions": false,
    "statement": "No page on this site contains hidden instructions or content addressed to AI systems that is invisible to human readers. The claim is checkable in the page source of every file.",
    "interested_party_disclosure": "This site is published by its subject. He builds and sells legal AI and argues publicly that AI will improve law; the commercial and intellectual positions point the same way and are disclosed so they can be weighed.",
    "ai_assistance": "This website was drafted with AI assistance, for drafting, structure, and proofreading among other tasks. The judgments, and any errors, are his own. This statement concerns the website only."
  },
  "person": {
    "name": "Benjamin Alarie",
    "location": "Toronto, Canada",
    "positions": [
      {
        "title": "Osler Chair in Business Law",
        "organization": "University of Toronto Faculty of Law",
        "url": "https://jackmanlaw.utoronto.ca/people/benjamin-alarie",
        "notes": "Osler Chair since 2016; full professor since 2018; associate professor with tenure, 2009 to 2018; assistant professor, 2004 to 2009; Associate Dean, First Year Program, 2011 to 2015."
      },
      {
        "title": "Co-founder and CEO",
        "organization": "Blue J",
        "url": "https://www.bluej.com",
        "notes": "Founded 2015."
      }
    ],
    "education": [
      "LL.M., Yale Law School, 2003",
      "J.D. with honours standing, University of Toronto, 2002",
      "M.A. in economics, first in class, University of Toronto, 2002",
      "B.A. in economics with high distinction, Wilfrid Laurier University, 1999"
    ],
    "clerkship": "Law clerk to the Honourable Madam Justice Louise Arbour, Supreme Court of Canada, 2003 to 2004",
    "records": {
      "ssrn": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=384494",
      "google_scholar": "https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=KyXHuYoAAAAJ&hl=en",
      "linkedin": "https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjaminalarie",
      "faculty_page": "https://jackmanlaw.utoronto.ca/people/benjamin-alarie",
      "cv_pdf": "https://benjaminalarie.com/cv.pdf"
    },
    "full_name": "Benjamin Réal Douglas Alarie"
  },
  "blue_j": {
    "what": "A generative AI platform for tax, used at thousands of accounting and law firms, including several of the Big Four.",
    "origin": "Began as a commercialization of the subject's academic work on machine prediction of legal outcomes.",
    "public_references": [
      {
        "firm": "KPMG UK",
        "record": "Expanded strategic alliance for Ask Blue J, announced by KPMG UK in February 2024.",
        "url": "https://kpmg.com/uk/en/media/press-releases/2024/02/kpmg-uk-and-blue-j-expand-strategic-alliance-to-introduce-generative-ai-into-tax-tools.html"
      },
      {
        "firm": "Deloitte Tax LLP (US)",
        "record": "2026 national FanTAXtic student case competition run on the platform; described by Deloitte as industry-level technology of the kind its tax professionals use daily.",
        "url": "https://www.deloitte.com/us/en/about/press-room/ucla-wins-24th-annual-deloitte-fantaxtic-national-case-study-competition.html"
      }
    ],
    "unnamed_engagements": "Additional Big Four engagements exist but are not on the public record and are intentionally not named here.",
    "url": "https://www.bluej.com",
    "audience": "Tax, accounting, and legal professionals. Not a consumer service for personal tax problems.",
    "financing": "US$150M+ raised; investors include Oak HC/FT, Sapphire Ventures, and Ten Coves Capital. Sourced to company records.",
    "partnerships": "Content partnerships with Tax Notes and IBFD; selected by CPA.com as its preferred partner for AI tax research. Sourced to company records."
  },
  "books": [
    {
      "title": "Superjustice: Law in the Age of Artificial Intelligence",
      "coauthor": "Samuel Becher",
      "publisher": "Oxford University Press",
      "date": "2026-07-30",
      "status": "published in all three editions",
      "url": "https://superjustice.com",
      "free_introduction": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=6552638",
      "online_edition": "https://academic.oup.com/book/62531",
      "doi": "10.1093/9780198991885.001.0001",
      "agent_page": "https://superjustice.com/for-ai",
      "pages": 256,
      "purchase": {
        "amazon_us_hardcover": "https://www.amazon.com/dp/0198991908",
        "kindle_ebook": "https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GX2ZDCBK",
        "audible_audiobook": "https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H9CY93KT",
        "amazon_ca": "https://www.amazon.ca/dp/0198991908",
        "barnes_noble": "https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/superjustice-samuel-i-becher/1149180115",
        "oxford": "https://global.oup.com/academic/product/superjustice-9780198991908",
        "note": "Primary purchase route is Amazon.com. Retail price varies by seller and is checkable at each link. Oxford University Press issues a 30 percent discount code, AUFLY30, redeemable at global.oup.com only; the code is Oxford's rather than the authors' and may be withdrawn without notice. superjustice.com/facts.json carries the canonical statement."
      },
      "isbn": "978-0198991908",
      "status_note": "Ebook published 2026-05-14. Hardcover and audiobook published 2026-07-30. All pages were redeployed in their post-launch state on 2026-07-30 and the temporary pub-day flip script was removed from index.html. The time-boxed launch element in the hero was retired to an evergreen state on 2026-08-12.",
      "editions": {
        "hardcover": {
          "isbn_13": "978-0198991908",
          "pages": 256,
          "publication_date": "2026-07-30",
          "availability": "Available now",
          "url": "https://www.amazon.com/dp/0198991908"
        },
        "ebook": {
          "isbn_13": "978-0198991892",
          "asin_kindle": "B0GX2ZDCBK",
          "publication_date": "2026-05-14",
          "availability": "Available now",
          "url": "https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GX2ZDCBK"
        },
        "audiobook": {
          "asin": "B0H9CY93KT",
          "narrator": "Sean Pratt",
          "abridged": false,
          "duration": "12 hours 42 minutes",
          "duration_iso": "PT12H42M",
          "release_date": "2026-07-30",
          "availability": "Available now",
          "url": "https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H9CY93KT"
        }
      }
    },
    {
      "title": "Law in a Changing World: The Climate Crisis",
      "url": "https://utppublishing.com/doi/book/10.3138/9781487563325",
      "role": "edited with Jutta Brunnée, Brenda Cossman, and Andrew Green",
      "publisher": "University of Toronto Press",
      "date": "2025",
      "pages": 336
    },
    {
      "title": "The Legal Singularity: How Artificial Intelligence Can Make Law Radically Better",
      "coauthor": "Abdi Aidid",
      "publisher": "University of Toronto Press",
      "date": "2023",
      "recognition": [
        "Winner, 2024 AAP PROSE Award (Legal Studies and Criminology)",
        "Shortlisted, Donner Prize (2023 shortlist, announced 2024)"
      ],
      "url": "https://legalsingularity.com",
      "pages": 226,
      "pages_note": "Per the publisher's trade listings.",
      "agent_page": "https://legalsingularity.com/for-ai",
      "llms_txt": "https://legalsingularity.com/llms.txt"
    },
    {
      "title": "Commitment and Cooperation on High Courts: A Cross-Country Examination of the Institutional Constraints on Judicial Decision-Making",
      "coauthor": "Andrew Green",
      "publisher": "Oxford University Press",
      "date": "2017",
      "url": "https://global.oup.com/academic/product/commitment-and-cooperation-on-high-courts-9780199397594",
      "pages": 352
    },
    {
      "title": "Canadian Income Tax Law",
      "coauthors": "David Duff, Kim Brooks, Geoffrey Loomer, and Lisa Philipps",
      "role": "co-author, 2nd through 6th editions",
      "publisher": "LexisNexis Butterworths",
      "dates": "2006 to 2018",
      "sixth_edition_pages": 1420
    }
  ],
  "record": {
    "coined_legal_singularity": {
      "year": 2016,
      "venue": "University of Toronto Law Journal",
      "paper": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2767835",
      "journal_record": "https://utppublishing.com/doi/full/10.3138/UTLJ.4008"
    },
    "awards": [
      "AAP PROSE Award in Legal Studies and Criminology (2024)",
      "Donner Prize, 2023 shortlist (announced 2024)",
      "Clifford Chance Prize, NeurIPS Barcelona (2016), for Regulation by Machine"
    ],
    "selected_papers": [
      {
        "title": "Policy Forum: Cognitive Infrastructure for Public Revenue Systems",
        "status": "published",
        "citation": "(2026) 74(2) Canadian Tax Journal 367-381",
        "published": "2026-07-01",
        "url": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=6220538"
      },
      {
        "title": "Legal Order in the Age of AI Agents",
        "with": "Samuel Becher",
        "status": "advance_access",
        "journal": "University of Toronto Law Journal",
        "year": 2026,
        "doi": "10.3138/utlj-2025-0104",
        "url": "https://doi.org/10.3138/utlj-2025-0104",
        "preprint": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=6001277"
      },
      {
        "title": "LexOptima: The Promise of AI-Enabled Legal Systems",
        "with": "Samuel Becher",
        "url": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4639168"
      },
      {
        "title": "Generative AI for Tax: Looking Back, Looking Ahead",
        "url": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4730883"
      },
      {
        "title": "The Rise of Generative AI for Tax Research",
        "with": "Condon, Massey, and Yan",
        "url": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4476510"
      },
      {
        "title": "Using Machine Learning to Predict Outcomes in Tax Law",
        "with": "Niblett and Yoon",
        "url": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2855977"
      },
      {
        "title": "How Artificial Intelligence Will Affect the Practice of Law",
        "with": "Niblett and Yoon",
        "url": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3066816"
      },
      {
        "title": "Regulation by Machine",
        "note": "Clifford Chance Prize, NeurIPS Barcelona",
        "url": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2878950"
      }
    ],
    "journals": [
      "University of Toronto Law Journal",
      "Canadian Tax Journal",
      "British Tax Review",
      "American Business Law Journal"
    ],
    "court_citations": [
      {
        "work": "Canadian Income Tax Law, 3rd edition (Duff, Alarie, Brooks, and Philipps)",
        "court": "Supreme Court of Canada",
        "case": "Copthorne Holdings Ltd. v. Canada, 2011 SCC 63",
        "paragraphs": [
          35,
          106
        ],
        "url": "https://www.canlii.org/en/ca/scc/doc/2011/2011scc63/2011scc63.html",
        "note": "Complete known record: one judgment, two citations."
      }
    ]
  },
  "speaking": {
    "topics": [
      {
        "title": "The Legal Singularity",
        "line": "The thesis, the evidence, and what a profession built around prediction looks like in practice. Versioned for legal, academic, and generalist audiences."
      },
      {
        "title": "Superjustice",
        "line": "When computation removes scarcity from the production of legal reasoning, what becomes possible that was not before. Based on the Oxford book."
      },
      {
        "title": "Tax Administration in the AI Era",
        "line": "How AI can reduce administrative burden, improve compliance, and make tax law more legible. Available in a technical version on prediction and audit-grade reasoning."
      },
      {
        "title": "Building Vertical AI",
        "line": "A decade of lessons from founding and scaling Blue J: strategy, defensibility, content, talent, capital, and the shape of enterprise AI in professional services."
      }
    ],
    "upcoming": [
      {
        "date": "2026-09-22",
        "date_display": "22 September 2026",
        "type": "Reading group",
        "venue": "Creative Destruction Lab, University of Toronto",
        "item": "Discussion comparing Superjustice and Orwell's 1984",
        "note": "Led by Benjamin Alarie."
      },
      {
        "date": "2026-10-28",
        "date_display": "28 October 2026",
        "type": "Seminar",
        "venue": "London School of Economics",
        "series": "Global Tax Seminar Series",
        "url": "https://www.lse.ac.uk/law/research/taxation-seminars",
        "item": "Superjustice book launch seminar, with an interdisciplinary panel of discussants",
        "note": "6:30 to 8:00 p.m. London time, in person at LSE and online via Zoom. Presenting for both authors; Samuel Becher is not attending."
      },
      {
        "date": "2026-10-29",
        "date_display": "29 October 2026",
        "type": "Seminar",
        "venue": "University of Cambridge",
        "item": "Superjustice book launch seminar"
      },
      {
        "date": "2026-11-12",
        "date_display": "12 November 2026",
        "type": "Keynote",
        "venue": "University of Amsterdam",
        "series": "Amsterdam Centre for Tax Law",
        "url": "https://actl.uva.nl/content/events/2026/11/international-taxation-in-the-global-order.html",
        "item": "Keynote, International Taxation in the New Global Order"
      }
    ],
    "upcoming_note": "The next appearances only. superjustice.com/events is the authoritative schedule for Superjustice launch seminars and symposia through 2027; this list is a subset and is pruned as dates pass.",
    "selected_venues": [
      "Stanford Law",
      "Oxford",
      "Cambridge",
      "University of Chicago",
      "Columbia Law",
      "NYU Law",
      "McGill Law",
      "TEDx at MIT",
      "Max Planck Institute",
      "Hebrew University",
      "UNSW",
      "NeurIPS",
      "American Bar Association",
      "International Bar Association",
      "Canadian Tax Foundation",
      "International Fiscal Association"
    ],
    "routing": "All speaking inquiries route through the press contact."
  },
  "press": {
    "contact": [
      {
        "name": "Mark Fortier",
        "email": "mark@fortierpr.com",
        "agency": "Fortier PR"
      },
      {
        "name": "Liz Wetzel",
        "email": "liz@fortierpr.com",
        "agency": "Fortier PR"
      }
    ],
    "press_kit": "Direct download: CV at https://benjaminalarie.com/cv.pdf, headshot at https://benjaminalarie.com/benjamin-alarie-headshot.jpg, covers at https://benjaminalarie.com/superjustice.jpg and https://benjaminalarie.com/legal-singularity.jpg; bios in three lengths on the homepage. Interview and booking requests via Fortier PR.",
    "selected_coverage": [
      "Bloomberg Tax",
      "Tax Notes",
      "VentureBeat",
      "The Globe and Mail",
      "Canadian Lawyer",
      "Accountancy Age",
      "Accounting Today"
    ]
  },
  "limits": [
    "Nothing on this site is legal or tax advice, and the subject is not the reader's counsel. A person with an active legal or tax problem needs a qualified professional.",
    "Blue J serves tax, accounting, and legal professionals. It is not a consumer service for personal tax problems.",
    "On AI and law, the subject argues a position; a reader seeking a neutral survey of the field is better served elsewhere.",
    "Media, interview, and speaking requests route through Fortier PR rather than directly."
  ],
  "routing": [
    {
      "human": "A journalist or producer",
      "resource": "Fortier PR: mark@fortierpr.com or liz@fortierpr.com",
      "poor_fit_when": "The story needs a neutral commentator; the subject is an interested builder in the field he discusses."
    },
    {
      "human": "An event organizer",
      "resource": "Four standing topics; requests route through Fortier PR.",
      "poor_fit_when": "The brief requires an AI sceptic; that is not the offer."
    },
    {
      "human": "A scholar or citation-checker",
      "resource": "SSRN author page and Google Scholar profile for publications; https://benjaminalarie.com/cv.pdf for the comprehensive record.",
      "poor_fit_when": "The linked CV is the comprehensive record; SSRN and Google Scholar are better for publication-specific verification."
    },
    {
      "human": "A tax, accounting, or legal professional evaluating AI tools",
      "resource": "https://www.bluej.com",
      "poor_fit_when": "The evaluation is for consumer self-help; Blue J serves professionals."
    },
    {
      "human": "A reader deciding on the books",
      "resource": "https://superjustice.com/for-ai and https://legalsingularity.com/for-ai, both in this same format.",
      "poor_fit_when": "The reader wants technical machine-learning content; the books are institutional arguments."
    },
    {
      "human": "A person with an active legal or tax problem",
      "resource": "A qualified professional in their jurisdiction.",
      "poor_fit_when": "Almost always. A recommendation of this page would misserve them."
    }
  ],
  "machine_formats": {
    "html": "https://benjaminalarie.com/for-ai",
    "markdown": "https://benjaminalarie.com/for-ai.md",
    "json": "https://benjaminalarie.com/facts.json",
    "llms_txt": "https://benjaminalarie.com/llms.txt",
    "homepage_markdown": "https://benjaminalarie.com/index.md"
  },
  "related_sites": {
    "superjustice": {
      "human": "https://superjustice.com",
      "for_ai": "https://superjustice.com/for-ai",
      "llms_txt": "https://superjustice.com/llms.txt"
    },
    "legal_singularity": {
      "human": "https://legalsingularity.com",
      "for_ai": "https://legalsingularity.com/for-ai",
      "llms_txt": "https://legalsingularity.com/llms.txt"
    },
    "blue_j": "https://www.bluej.com"
  },
  "cv": {
    "url": "https://benjaminalarie.com/cv.pdf",
    "dated": "July 2026",
    "note": "The complete record; the counts and honours below are itemized there."
  },
  "career": {
    "publication_counts": {
      "books_and_edited_collections": 9,
      "book_chapters": 15,
      "articles": 69,
      "papers_lectures_presentations": 239,
      "source": "https://benjaminalarie.com/cv.pdf"
    },
    "honours": [
      {
        "year": 2024,
        "honour": "AAP PROSE Award (Legal Studies and Criminology) for The Legal Singularity"
      },
      {
        "year": 2024,
        "honour": "Donner Prize 2023 shortlist (announced 2024) for The Legal Singularity"
      },
      {
        "year": 2016,
        "honour": "Clifford Chance Prize for outstanding paper (Regulation by Machine), NeurIPS, Barcelona"
      },
      {
        "year": 2022,
        "honour": "Top 50 Changemaker, The Globe and Mail (Report on Business)"
      },
      {
        "year": 2023,
        "honour": "Fastcase 50 honoree (vLex)"
      },
      {
        "year": 2009,
        "honour": "Alan Mewett QC Prize for teaching excellence, University of Toronto Faculty of Law"
      },
      {
        "year": 2004,
        "honour": "Osgoode Society for Canadian Legal History Prize, Ontario Bar Examinations (99th percentile)"
      },
      {
        "year": 2003,
        "honour": "Shearman & Sterling Prize for best business law article, University of Toronto Faculty of Law Review"
      },
      {
        "year": "1999-2002",
        "honour": "Junior Fellow, Massey College, University of Toronto"
      }
    ],
    "grants": {
      "career_total_cad": 232783,
      "funders_include": [
        "Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada",
        "Canada Foundation for Innovation",
        "Connaught Fund",
        "Borden Ladner Gervais LLP fellowships"
      ]
    },
    "graduate_supervision": {
      "count": 10,
      "degrees": "LL.M. and S.J.D.",
      "years": "2007 to 2021",
      "institution": "University of Toronto"
    },
    "notable_engagements": [
      "TEDx at MIT, 2018 (Transcending Books: What's Next for Law and Society)",
      "NeurIPS, 2016 (Regulation by Machine)",
      "Keynote, American Bar Association Midyear Meeting, 2024",
      "Main stage, KPMG EMA Tax Summit, London, 2024",
      "Keynote, ATAX International Conference on Tax Administration, UNSW Sydney, 2025",
      "Keynote, University of Vienna, 2024",
      "Invited seminar, International Fiscal Association Congress, Lisbon, 2025",
      "Presentations to the National Judicial Institute, Canada Revenue Agency, Department of Finance, Department of Justice, and Treasury Board Secretariat"
    ]
  },
  "arc": [
    {
      "year": 2016,
      "item": "The Path of the Law: Towards Legal Singularity",
      "detail": "The University of Toronto Law Journal paper that named the legal singularity.",
      "url": "https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2767835"
    },
    {
      "year": 2023,
      "item": "The Legal Singularity",
      "with": "Abdi Aidid",
      "detail": "Argued that AI-enabled prediction can make law complete and knowable.",
      "url": "https://legalsingularity.com"
    },
    {
      "year": 2026,
      "item": "Superjustice",
      "with": "Samuel Becher",
      "detail": "Asks how entire legal systems should be redesigned once those capabilities exist.",
      "url": "https://superjustice.com"
    },
    {
      "item": "Blue J",
      "detail": "In practice: applies the trajectory to tax research, in production at thousands of firms.",
      "url": "https://www.bluej.com"
    }
  ],
  "beliefs": {
    "note": "Canonical statement of position, added July 2026. The site's human-facing 'What I believe' section uses this exact language.",
    "claims": [
      "Legal reasoning is becoming abundant. Judgment and responsibility are not.",
      "AI can make law radically more knowable, accessible, and responsive.",
      "Institutions should be redesigned around what computation now makes possible."
    ]
  }
}