Tootfinder

The IRS open sourced most of its Direct File tax software on GitHub last week, fulfilling a legal requirement under the SHARE IT Act, despite Intuit pressure (Jason Koebler/404 Media)
https://www.404media.co/directfile-open-source-…

The IRS Tax Filing Software TurboTax Is Trying to Kill Just Got Open Sourced
Direct File has been open sourced, and its creators have left government to continue working on the "future of tax filing."

Long; central Massachusetts colonial history
Today on a whim I visited a site in Massachusetts marked as "Huguenot Fort Ruins" on OpenStreetMaps. I drove out with my 4-year-old through increasingly rural central Massachusetts forests & fields to end up on a narrow street near the top of a hill beside a small field. The neighboring houses had huge lawns, some with tractors.
Appropriately for this day and this moment in history, the history of the site turns out to be a microcosm of America. Across the field beyond a cross-shaped stone memorial stood an info board with a few diagrams and some text. The text of the main sign (including typos/misspellings) read:
"""
Town Is Formed
Early in the 1680's, interest began to generate to develop a town in the area west of Natick in the south central part of the Commonwealth that would be suitable for a settlement. A Mr. Hugh Campbell, a Scotch merchant of Boston petitioned the court for land for a colony. At about the same time, Joseph Dudley and William Stoughton also were desirous of obtaining land for a settlement. A claim was made for all lands west of the Blackstone River to the southern land of Massachusetts to a point northerly of the Springfield Road then running southwesterly until it joined the southern line of Massachusetts.
Associated with Dudley and Stoughton was Robert Thompson of London, England, Dr. Daniel Cox and John Blackwell, both of London and Thomas Freak of Hannington, Wiltshire, as proprietors. A stipulation in the acquisition of this land being that within four years thirty families and an orthodox minister settle in the area. An extension of this stipulation was granted at the end of the four years when no group large enough seemed to be willing to take up the opportunity.
In 1686, Robert Thompson met Gabriel Bernor and learned that he was seeking an area where his countrymen, who had fled their native France because of the Edict of Nantes, were desirous of a place to live. Their main concern was to settle in a place that would allow them freedom of worship. New Oxford, as it was the so-named, at that time included the larger part of Charlton, one-fourth of Auburn, one-fifth of Dudley and several square miles of the northeast portion of Southbridge as well as the easterly ares now known as Webster.
Joseph Dudley's assessment that the area was capable of a good settlement probably was based on the idea of the meadows already established along with the plains, ponds, brooks and rivers. Meadows were a necessity as they provided hay for animal feed and other uses by the settlers. The French River tributary books and streams provided a good source for fishing and hunting. There were open areas on the plains as customarily in November of each year, the Indians burnt over areas to keep them free of underwood and brush. It appeared then that this area was ready for settling.
The first seventy-five years of the settling of the Town of Oxford originally known as Manchaug, embraced three different cultures. The Indians were known to be here about 1656 when the Missionary, John Eliott and his partner Daniel Gookin visited in the praying towns. Thirty years later, in 1686, the Huguenots walked here from Boston under the guidance of their leader Isaac Bertrand DuTuffeau. The Huguenot's that arrived were not peasants, but were acknowledged to be the best Agriculturist, Wine Growers, Merchant's, and Manufacter's in France. There were 30 families consisting of 52 people. At the time of their first departure (10 years), due to Indian insurrection, there were 80 people in the group, and near their Meetinghouse/Church was a Cemetery that held 20 bodies. In 1699, 8 to 10 familie's made a second attempt to re-settle, failing after only four years, with the village being completely abandoned in 1704.
The English colonist made their way here in 1713 and established what has become a permanent settlement.
"""
All that was left of the fort was a crumbling stone wall that would have been the base of a higher wooden wall according to a picture of a model (I didn't think to get a shot of that myself). Only trees and brush remain where the multi-story main wooden building was.
This story has so many echoes in the present:
- The rich colonialists from Boston & London agree to settle the land, buying/taking land "rights" from the colonial British court that claimed jurisdiction without actually having control of the land. Whether the sponsors ever actually visited the land themselves I don't know. They surely profited somehow, whether from selling on the land rights later or collecting taxes/rent or whatever, by they needed poor laborers to actually do the work of developing the land (& driving out the original inhabitants, who had no say in the machinations of the Boston court).
- The land deal was on condition that there capital-holders who stood to profit would find settlers to actually do the work of colonizing. The British crown wanted more territory to be controlled in practice not just in theory, but they weren't going to be the ones to do the hard work.
- The capital-holders actually failed to find enough poor suckers to do their dirty work for 4 years, until the Huguenots, fleeing religious persecution in France, were desperate enough to accept their terms.
- Of course, the land was only so ripe for settlement because of careful tending over centuries by the natives who were eventually driven off, and whose land management practices are abandoned today. Given the mention of praying towns (& dates), this was after King Phillip's war, which resulted in at least some forced resettlement of native tribes around the area, but the descendants of those "Indians" mentioned in this sign are still around. For example, this is the site of one local band of Nipmuck, whose namesake lake is about 5 miles south of the fort site: #LandBack.

Battery electric vehicles had a market share of 18% last month in Germany; sales 45% higher than in May 2024.
China's BYD up 824%, easily surpassing Tesla (down 36%), but still only 4% share in Germany's BEV market.
https://www.

Homeland Security’s list of ‘sanctuary cities’ pulled down after sheriffs object - Raw Story
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-administration-takes-down-sanctuary-city-list-following-law-enforcement-ba/

@… Just wanted to let you know that Captain Hikaru Sulu is currently making a guest appearance in our Lost Era Star Trek TTRPG. He came up as one of three persons, unusually interested in the ongoings of the court-martial for following orders (read: being framed) of the First Officer of our unit, the USS Sato. 😀

Leaked documents: Meta is training custom AI chatbots to message users unprompted, following up on past chats to boost engagement on its AI Studio platform (Business Insider)
https://www.businessinsider.com/meta-ai-studio-…

Leaked docs show Meta training custom AI chatbots to be more proactive
Leaked guidelines show how Meta's custom AI chatbots are trained to get more proactive, following up with users to increase retention.

Spotted a Tesla Semi truck in the wild, pulling out of the Tesla lot onto Page Mill Rd. Driver in green safety vest sits in the middle of the cab (no passengers?). While stopped at a light it looked like the driver was fighting with trim falling off the left A pillar.
A few blocks later the truck blew through the red light! Particularly scary if Tesla's AI was "driving".

I've enjoyed Michael Madsen in films ever since I first saw Reservoir Dogs, probably when I was 13 or 14, right after it came out. And then in Species, Sin City, Kill Bill- and the most recent Madsen thing I've seen, The Hateful Eight, from 10 years ago. And he was in 8 movies last year, and 4 still upcoming! Truly one of our time's greatest actors, and amazing right up to the end. He'll be missed. RIP

NYSE Arca files with the SEC to list a Bitcoin ETF linked to Trump Media and Technology Group, the parent company of Truth Social and Truth.fi (Vildana Hajric/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-…