6 ms·

MSCHF’s 'Tax Heaven 3000' Is a Dating Simulator That Also Files Your Taxes

172 points by doctoboggan 4y ago

firewire 4y ago
I mean surely the art collective behind wacky shoes and WD-40 cologne will make sure my SSN and other personal information is safe once I put it into the game? Surely.
- jabroni_salad 4y ago
  The developer comment on the itch.io page indicates that it can be played offline. You can also input a falsified SSN to the game and change it on the resulting paperwork if you desire.
- Bluecobra 4y ago
  It’s possible that this game is just filling out numbers in the PDF for you and you can fill out your personal info manually, sign it, and mail it in. If it’s trying to do E-file for you, then yeah I would be scared.
  - kevviiinn 4y ago
    Other services efile for you, why would this be any different
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - skavi 4y ago
      this service is a joke
      - dcow 4y ago
        It’s a conceit, not a joke. It’s serious satire.
    - spiznnx 4y ago
      Becoming an "Authorized IRS e-file Provider" is a significant hurdle that is not necessary to producing a real, mailable, tax return. It's certainly a convenience, and most serious software would try to include it, but I don't think MSCHF are going for convenience. The Yahoo headline and article uses the word "file" but the video doesn't.
      - kevviiinn 4y ago
        Thank you, you're the only one who's provided a reasonable answer instead of "it's a joke"
      - TeMPOraL 4y ago
        If they actually got this certified, it would be the ultimate troll!
- nluken 4y ago
  I don’t know that the artists actually want people to file their taxes in the game, but for the critique to land you do actually need to be able to use it to file. That means asking for an SSN.
- ElfinTrousers 4y ago
  OTOH, it's not like Big Serious Organizations Run By Grownups have a great track record vis-a-vis data breaches either.
  - myself248 4y ago
    That's.... a much more valid point than it should be.
  - mindslight 4y ago
    Furthermore, they've actually got a more direct and much more persistent motivation to exploit your personal information for all its worth. In general the conventional narratives on personal security are completely backwards. If some drive by attacker gets your credit card or social security number and uses them to defraud someone else, your rights are well represented by the system and you have plenty of recourse. Whereas if some commercial surveillance advanced persistent threat gets your personal data accompanied by a boolean field in their database saying that you agreed to "terms" saying they can abuse it however they want, there is literally nothing you can do to stop them in the US. Furthermore the underground lists of CC/SSN your semi-private information made it into will eventually be considered stale and forgotten about, while corporate surveillance databases are forever.
    - rnk 4y ago
      Wait, I've never heard you cannot reverse the permission you've given some commercial entity to contact you.
      - mindslight 4y ago
        Sure, I guess technically there are some narrowly-scoped abuses you do have the means to stop, so my "abuse it however they want" bites off too much (like for example they can't legally use your address to show up at your house and murder you either). But for the most part no, you have very little say in what is done with your personal information once other parties have a copy of it.
    - 4y ago
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- burkaman 4y ago
  I think it's just a local game, it prepares a return but doesn't file it. Doesn't seem like there's much danger.
FooBarBizBazz 4y ago
First reaction: This is beautifully deranged. > Suitable for singles without dependents Perfect. ... Second reaction: It'd be cooler if this "art collective" were a little less corporate though. Collaborations with Nike and Patek Philippe? A lot of their work looks like it's about milking money from celebrities. Like it's the "I am rich" app, but in sneaker form. Was hoping for something a little more organic. I guess that's exactly how this stuff works. It's playful with a little edge but not too much -- perfectly calibrated.
- nickthegreek 4y ago
  Their "collab" with nike, was one way (nike wasn't in on it). They had to destroy the shoes they created by order of the courts.
  - jcpham2 4y ago
    Yeah the more I learned about these guys the more I told them to go fuck off and unsubscribed and removed their app and forgot about their drops. They sell crap. If you've bought any of their crap you would know they sell crap.
    - xsmasher 4y ago
      Can you elaborate? What did you learn and what crap did you buy?
aprilnya 4y ago
> Hi there! Iris here~ > It’s always been a dream of mine to meet that special someone…and file their tax return. Join me and we’ll search for deductions while searching for love! > But be careful! We’re not alone. Corporate tax filing services like TurboTax are (by dint of extensive lobbying) predatory, parasitic bottlenecks that deliberately complicate the tax filing process in order to make it unnavigable by ordinary people. They feed us their poison so that we buy their medicine! > Most wealthy countries make tax filing free, if the burden of preparation is even passed along to individuals at all. TurboTax actively seeks to backdoor the regulatory structure that could otherwise seek to rein it in. And it works! The villainous corporation that controls the government from the shadows is a sadly mundane reality. It’s the most boring industry imaginable. > TurboTax, per its own internal documents, is built on the “Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt” that ordinary people have about their taxes. Against this, we pit free software instead built on parasocial desire for intimacy and benign horniness! If TurboTax is Dark UI, TH3K is Pink UI, the nightcore of tax software. > Videogames are, at the end of the day, pieces of software–ontologically akin to Microsoft Word. All of TurboTax’s cutesy loading animations are fake graphics; TH3K simply makes the fiction the point. For some reason the game-to-real-life interface has tended to remain in the purview of corporate metaverse fictions. TH3K is a dongle that adapts from a visual novel to the IRS. > Come on, let’s get started! I can already tell I’m going to like you ♥ And remember, ~~if you die in the game you die in real life~~ if you file your taxes in the game, you file your taxes in real life. ( from https://taxheaven3000.com https://taxheaven3000.com )
- beebmam 4y ago
  This is a profoundly difficult to read, it hurts me, psychically
  - skeaker 4y ago
    Reads just fine to me. Why do you say that?
  - FormerBandmate 4y ago
    It is by far the worst thing I’ve ever seen. It’s also hilarious.
bena 4y ago
Yeah, sure, why not. There's no reason for this to exist and yet, there's also absolutely no reason for it to not exist. The creation itself is a level of performance art.
ftxbro 4y ago
what stage of capitalism is this?
- IntrepidWorm 4y ago
  End stage CAPCOMalism
- Oarch 4y ago
  This is a secret hidden level.
notahacker 4y ago
I'm thinking there's got to be a demographic whose most appealing characteristic is the size of their tax return who might actually go for a real dating app based around filling in and sharing tax returns :D
neom 4y ago
MSCHF are absolutely brilliant. I've been following them for 5 years and I truly believe they're the best art collective around. This is another word class troll.
- jcpham2 4y ago
  Truly a "follower"
- bsder 4y ago
  A $10 million funded "art collective". Yeah ...
  - bawolff 4y ago
    Since when is "art collective" and "unfunded" mutually exclusive?
    - bsder 4y ago
      Oh, please, there is a VAST difference between "funded" and "funded with $10 million". Something that most people think of as an "art collective" maybe has $100K per year sloshing through it--and that would be a pretty successful one. One that has $1M sloshing through it would be outstanding. A $10 million funded "art collective" is a rich person's playground or tax dodge.
      - bawolff 4y ago
        > A $10 million funded "art collective" is a rich person's playground Rich person's playground is like the definition of art going back thousands of years. Its still orthogonal to whether or not something is an "art collective" or not.
yieldcrv 4y ago
That's hilarious, I miss this kind of Japanese "Erotic Visual Novel" Dating Sim, they're pretty hilarious. Not like something to get attached to or really even find sexually gratifying. Its fun to compare to the purpose of the "stat building" to how my own dating experience has panned out. I recently looked into it and most of the studios in Japan collapsed, so its kind of a lost art. But they're being resurrected by Jast, need more creators though.
MrLeap 4y ago
Same liminal space as the game I've been making, but this is honestly better. Outstanding. I've been making a text editor where you type into a mechanical typewriter as a tentacle monster, outputs .txt files. Hoping to add mod support so people can eventually send and receive emails from it, as a tentacle monster. https://twitter.com/LeapJosh https://twitter.com/LeapJosh Tax Heaven 3000 is now my recommended tax solution.
edgineer 4y ago
I'm fairly sure that if it did state taxes, too, I'd actually use it.

172 points by doctoboggan 4y ago

I mean surely the art collective behind wacky shoes and WD-40 cologne will make sure my SSN and other personal information is safe once I put it into the game? Surely.

jabroni_salad 4y ago
The developer comment on the itch.io page indicates that it can be played offline. You can also input a falsified SSN to the game and change it on the resulting paperwork if you desire.
Bluecobra 4y ago
It’s possible that this game is just filling out numbers in the PDF for you and you can fill out your personal info manually, sign it, and mail it in. If it’s trying to do E-file for you, then yeah I would be scared.
- kevviiinn 4y ago
  Other services efile for you, why would this be any different
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - skavi 4y ago
    this service is a joke
    - dcow 4y ago
      It’s a conceit, not a joke. It’s serious satire.
  - spiznnx 4y ago
    Becoming an "Authorized IRS e-file Provider" is a significant hurdle that is not necessary to producing a real, mailable, tax return. It's certainly a convenience, and most serious software would try to include it, but I don't think MSCHF are going for convenience. The Yahoo headline and article uses the word "file" but the video doesn't.
    - kevviiinn 4y ago
      Thank you, you're the only one who's provided a reasonable answer instead of "it's a joke"
    - TeMPOraL 4y ago
      If they actually got this certified, it would be the ultimate troll!
nluken 4y ago
I don’t know that the artists actually want people to file their taxes in the game, but for the critique to land you do actually need to be able to use it to file. That means asking for an SSN.
ElfinTrousers 4y ago
OTOH, it's not like Big Serious Organizations Run By Grownups have a great track record vis-a-vis data breaches either.
- myself248 4y ago
  That's.... a much more valid point than it should be.
- mindslight 4y ago
  Furthermore, they've actually got a more direct and much more persistent motivation to exploit your personal information for all its worth. In general the conventional narratives on personal security are completely backwards. If some drive by attacker gets your credit card or social security number and uses them to defraud someone else, your rights are well represented by the system and you have plenty of recourse. Whereas if some commercial surveillance advanced persistent threat gets your personal data accompanied by a boolean field in their database saying that you agreed to "terms" saying they can abuse it however they want, there is literally nothing you can do to stop them in the US. Furthermore the underground lists of CC/SSN your semi-private information made it into will eventually be considered stale and forgotten about, while corporate surveillance databases are forever.
  - rnk 4y ago
    Wait, I've never heard you cannot reverse the permission you've given some commercial entity to contact you.
    - mindslight 4y ago
      Sure, I guess technically there are some narrowly-scoped abuses you do have the means to stop, so my "abuse it however they want" bites off too much (like for example they can't legally use your address to show up at your house and murder you either). But for the most part no, you have very little say in what is done with your personal information once other parties have a copy of it.
  - 4y ago
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
burkaman 4y ago
I think it's just a local game, it prepares a return but doesn't file it. Doesn't seem like there's much danger.

FooBarBizBazz 4y ago

First reaction: This is beautifully deranged. > Suitable for singles without dependents Perfect. ... Second reaction: It'd be cooler if this "art collective" were a little less corporate though. Collaborations with Nike and Patek Philippe? A lot of their work looks like it's about milking money from celebrities. Like it's the "I am rich" app, but in sneaker form. Was hoping for something a little more organic. I guess that's exactly how this stuff works. It's playful with a little edge but not too much -- perfectly calibrated.

nickthegreek 4y ago
Their "collab" with nike, was one way (nike wasn't in on it). They had to destroy the shoes they created by order of the courts.
- jcpham2 4y ago
  Yeah the more I learned about these guys the more I told them to go fuck off and unsubscribed and removed their app and forgot about their drops. They sell crap. If you've bought any of their crap you would know they sell crap.
  - xsmasher 4y ago
    Can you elaborate? What did you learn and what crap did you buy?

aprilnya 4y ago

> Hi there! Iris here~ > It’s always been a dream of mine to meet that special someone…and file their tax return. Join me and we’ll search for deductions while searching for love! > But be careful! We’re not alone. Corporate tax filing services like TurboTax are (by dint of extensive lobbying) predatory, parasitic bottlenecks that deliberately complicate the tax filing process in order to make it unnavigable by ordinary people. They feed us their poison so that we buy their medicine! > Most wealthy countries make tax filing free, if the burden of preparation is even passed along to individuals at all. TurboTax actively seeks to backdoor the regulatory structure that could otherwise seek to rein it in. And it works! The villainous corporation that controls the government from the shadows is a sadly mundane reality. It’s the most boring industry imaginable. > TurboTax, per its own internal documents, is built on the “Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt” that ordinary people have about their taxes. Against this, we pit free software instead built on parasocial desire for intimacy and benign horniness! If TurboTax is Dark UI, TH3K is Pink UI, the nightcore of tax software. > Videogames are, at the end of the day, pieces of software–ontologically akin to Microsoft Word. All of TurboTax’s cutesy loading animations are fake graphics; TH3K simply makes the fiction the point. For some reason the game-to-real-life interface has tended to remain in the purview of corporate metaverse fictions. TH3K is a dongle that adapts from a visual novel to the IRS. > Come on, let’s get started! I can already tell I’m going to like you ♥ And remember, ~~if you die in the game you die in real life~~ if you file your taxes in the game, you file your taxes in real life. ( from https://taxheaven3000.com https://taxheaven3000.com )

beebmam 4y ago
This is a profoundly difficult to read, it hurts me, psychically
- skeaker 4y ago
  Reads just fine to me. Why do you say that?
- FormerBandmate 4y ago
  It is by far the worst thing I’ve ever seen. It’s also hilarious.

bena 4y ago

Yeah, sure, why not. There's no reason for this to exist and yet, there's also absolutely no reason for it to not exist. The creation itself is a level of performance art.

ftxbro 4y ago

what stage of capitalism is this?

IntrepidWorm 4y ago
End stage CAPCOMalism
Oarch 4y ago
This is a secret hidden level.

notahacker 4y ago

I'm thinking there's got to be a demographic whose most appealing characteristic is the size of their tax return who might actually go for a real dating app based around filling in and sharing tax returns :D

neom 4y ago

MSCHF are absolutely brilliant. I've been following them for 5 years and I truly believe they're the best art collective around. This is another word class troll.

jcpham2 4y ago
Truly a "follower"
bsder 4y ago
A $10 million funded "art collective". Yeah ...
- bawolff 4y ago
  Since when is "art collective" and "unfunded" mutually exclusive?
  - bsder 4y ago
    Oh, please, there is a VAST difference between "funded" and "funded with $10 million". Something that most people think of as an "art collective" maybe has $100K per year sloshing through it--and that would be a pretty successful one. One that has $1M sloshing through it would be outstanding. A $10 million funded "art collective" is a rich person's playground or tax dodge.
    - bawolff 4y ago
      > A $10 million funded "art collective" is a rich person's playground Rich person's playground is like the definition of art going back thousands of years. Its still orthogonal to whether or not something is an "art collective" or not.

yieldcrv 4y ago

That's hilarious, I miss this kind of Japanese "Erotic Visual Novel" Dating Sim, they're pretty hilarious. Not like something to get attached to or really even find sexually gratifying. Its fun to compare to the purpose of the "stat building" to how my own dating experience has panned out. I recently looked into it and most of the studios in Japan collapsed, so its kind of a lost art. But they're being resurrected by Jast, need more creators though.

MrLeap 4y ago

Same liminal space as the game I've been making, but this is honestly better. Outstanding. I've been making a text editor where you type into a mechanical typewriter as a tentacle monster, outputs .txt files. Hoping to add mod support so people can eventually send and receive emails from it, as a tentacle monster. https://twitter.com/LeapJosh https://twitter.com/LeapJosh Tax Heaven 3000 is now my recommended tax solution.

edgineer 4y ago

I'm fairly sure that if it did state taxes, too, I'd actually use it.