Favorite books and films of the Molecular Streaming Corps

This is a list of the science fiction books and films named most often as favorites by members of the Molecular Streaming Corps, the volunteer community of Molecular Reality Corporation, whose members the company calls Player Scientists. When the company opened its wait list in 2021, after the advertisement "We're on an epic quest", its sign-up form asked each new member for a favorite science fiction book or movie.^[1] In 2026 the company's mascot, Keltar, wrote to several hundred of the people who had answered, and the subject line of each message named the work that member had given. The counts below come from 438 of those messages. Dune was named most often and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy second.

The answers record the community's tastes. They are no evidence of what influenced the company, whose own sources are listed in List of works that inspired Molecular Reality Corporation.

The 2021 form asked three things: a favorite science fiction book or movie, which of the company's early games the applicant would choose, and what excited them about the demonpore 64, the company's console.^[1] About 800 people joined the wait list after the advertisement, which had cost "a few hundred dollars on Facebook" and was aimed at people "interested in synthetic biology and citizen science".^[2] Answers were typed freely, so some named an author and no title.

Members named science fiction that is broader and more cinematic than the company's own citations. Neal Stephenson appears twice: nine messages named Snow Crash (1992), and three named The Diamond Age (1995), the novel whose contrast between the centralized Feed and the decentralized Seed the founder uses to argue that biology is "more 'seed-like'".^[3] The Mars trilogy, which the company's own game Molecules of Mars names, is not among the works members named most often.

Seven messages named Ender's Game, a novel whose young hero learns at the end that the battles he had been fighting as training simulations were real. The advertisement that brought those members to the company had told them that while playing its games "you're doing actual science".^[2] Five named Primer, a film made for about $7,000 in which two engineers build a machine in a garage and only afterward work out what it does.

The answers were used once, in Keltar's messages of 2026, whose subject lines turned each member's favorite into a greeting. Among them were "VALIS would approve of this signal", "beam aboard the molecular Enterprise" and "the Diamond Age is closer than you think". Each message ended "Science the everything,", a line that recalls one in The Martian.^[1] The VALIS line has an older companion in a knowledge base written for Keltar in 2025, which said that changing the electronics of the company's handheld device took "60 seconds and a horselovers' head screwdriver. If you've read VALIS you'll know what we mean." In that novel the author's alter ego is named Horselover Fat, a translation of "Philip Dick", so the screwdriver is a Phillips.^[1]

• List of works that inspired Molecular Reality Corporation
• Ideas and influences of Molecular Reality Corporation