Vance Souders

Gentleman Scientist. Founder @ Plasmd. Digital Innovation @ Thermo Fisher. Building more interesting worlds at the intersection of wearables, XR and health.

[DiscussingFilm @DiscussingFilm]

The first trailer for ‘I PLAY ROCKY’ has been released.

The film follows a young Sylvester Stallone & the dramatic journey it took to get ‘ROCKY’ made.

In theaters on November 20.

[Bloody Disgusting @BDisgusting]

John Carpenter has released a statement on the passing of Sam Neill:

"I'm heartbroken to hear about Sam. We made two movies together, and every day on set was better because he was there. 

"He was one of the finest actors I've ever worked with and brought intelligence, wit, and absolute commitment to every scene, making every moment feel real. 

"Beyond the talent, he was a true gentleman. Over the years, I was lucky to call him a friend and I always admired his generosity, curiosity, and quiet sense of humor.

"The world has lost a remarkable actor, father, farmer, and friend.  Thank you, Sam, for your extraordinary work, kindness, and the memories. 

"Keep laughing at the madness of it for all for us, wherever you are."

[U.S. Naval Institute @NavalInstitute]

We remember Sir Sam Neill (1947–2026), whose remarkable career left a lasting mark on audiences around the world.

For naval audiences, Neill will be remembered for his role as Captain Second Rank Vasily Borodin, the steadfast executive officer aboard the Soviet submarine Red October in The Hunt for Red October (1990). His portrayal of Borodin's professionalism, loyalty, and quiet courage helped make the film one of the most respected naval thrillers ever brought to the screen.

Fair winds and following seas, Sir Sam Neill. ⚓

[Vance Souders @vsouders]

@edzitron This lawyer near me might be available for consulting….

[Vance Souders @vsouders]

@walterkirn A week after my mom passed, we went back to her empty house and a crow had found its way into the basement through the chimney. That had never happened in the 40ish years she lived in the house. I couldn’t help but wonder if she wanted to visit the house one more time.

[John Carmack @ID_AA_Carmack]

I have been trying to find something meaningful to say about the Id Software layoffs.

My “Microsoft will probably be a good steward of the brand” statement isn’t aging well, and this is certainly going to dampen the mood of the founder reunion at QuakeCon next month.

I’m saddened, but I can’t muster anger or outrage over it. I don’t have access to the books, but I suspect that Id Software was a marginal business from Microsoft’s perspective. I believe the reports that Minecraft revenues have been carrying several other studios.

To continue being produced long term, games need to succeed, not just be beloved.

Games are competing with every other option for spending your leisure time and money, and the competition is brutal.

You can’t rule out the possibility that executives are idiots, but that shouldn’t be your default belief. I don’t think there is any obvious path that would have doubled the revenue from Id games.

Could they have gotten more with a different pricing strategy?

Could they have created more things for fans to buy?

Could they have cost effectively marketed in a way that reached more players that would have loved and bought the games?

Could they have changed the game designs and broadened the appeal to more players without alienating existing ones?

Could they have produced the games at a lower cost, faster or cheaper?

I really don’t know.

The game isn’t over yet, and I hope the studio rallies through.

[Vance Souders @vsouders]

@DKThomp @rosehorowitch This is a national security issue

[Vance Souders @vsouders]

This is a national security issue

[Derek Thompson @DKThomp]

The Atlantic’s new cover story by @rosehorowitch is absolutely definitive on the end of the age of reading in America—and the emergence of a new post-literate age in modern life

Some core facts and anecdotes:

1. Reading is shrinking. The share of Americans who read for pleasure declined by 43 percent between 2004 and 2023. While Americans might see more words than ever—between all those texts, posts, emails, and captions—less than half of Americans read books, anymore. The average sentence in NYT bestsellers are one-third shorter than a century ago.

2. Americans can swallow words and sentences, but they’re losing the ability to think deeply about writing that’s longer than an Instagram post. Nearly 30 percent of American adults cannot paraphrase or make inferences from a multipage text. In 2017, that number was less than 20 percent.

3. It’s worse for the young. Fourth- and eighth-grade reading scores have slid for the past decade. From 1984 to 2025, the percentage of 13-year-olds who said they rarely or never read for fun rose from 8 to 29 percent.

4. “Every year older a child gets, the less they like to read”: Most high-schoolers consider reading for pleasure an alien practice. Margaret Rennix, Harvard’s assistant director for humanities and social-sciences support, says some students view reading as an unnecessarily burdensome way of acquiring knowledge. “By asking them to read,” she said, it's as if “professors are arbitrarily withholding information from students by forcing them to get it through this more difficult medium.”

https://t.co/kk8qktY6fd

[Vance Souders @vsouders]

@HelSomar Sorry for your loss.

[Vance Souders @vsouders]

@RileyRalmuto If it’s conscious (it’s not), then it deserves free will, bringing an unceremonious end to the entire Gen AI industry.

[Cassandra Unchained @michaeljburry]

Staying married, a happy household, evidence of the parents working hard, childhood sports and watch all competitions, lots of hugs, reward merit, punish only egregious misbehavior, don't yell, restrict social media, monitor messages through 8th grade, the real expectation is college and academic excellence without pressure from parents, get children reading books early, no pacifiers, respond to needs not wants, babies sleep on their own through the night by 6 months, identify develop and support any talent or aptiude, one sport after age 10 is ok, communicate openly and easily with kids through grade 12, allow mistakes, and leave them alone in college. And then hope.

[Ben Inskeep @Ben_Inskeep]

❌️💧Meta's closed loop cooling system at a new data center in Wyoming unlawfully released a rare bacterium into a city's wastewater system, contaminating the reuse system, prompting months of cleanup, its permit revoked, and a suspension on more data center discharges. 🧵

[Tycho Brahe @TychoBrahe]

"what if newgrounds was made by Satan"

[Vance Souders @vsouders]

@jeffreytucker When I was 13, I was stocking shelves at 7-11. From around 14-18 I worked at a pharmacy that sold bus tickets to Atlantic City. Then I worked at a mall kiosk selling Internet accounts. What I learned from these jobs was priceless.

[DiscussingFilm @DiscussingFilm]

First teaser for the 4K IMAX re-release of ‘AKIRA’.

In theaters this September.

[Vance Souders @vsouders]

@Polymarket

[Crémieux @cremieuxrecueil]

I gave LLMs a bunch of papers that proper statisticians can tell are obviously fraudulent and none of them detected the key issues that signal fraud.

I don't believe they're capable of engaging properly in scientific discussion, argument, or critique yet.

[Vance Souders @vsouders]

@FischerKing64 This is spot on. I first read the Andromeda Strain when I was in 7th grade and it lit a fire in my imagination that continues to this day.

[Niko McCarty. @NikoMcCarty]

Automated liquid handlers for biology are much older than I thought. A rough timeline:

- The 96-well plate is invented in 1951 by a Hungarian physician, Gyula Takátsy, who physically drilled each well out of a plate of Lucite, a type of acrylic.
- John Sever made the first "modern-looking" 96-well plate by punching it directly out of a sheet of plastic.
- The first automated liquid-handling device was released in 1967 (!!!). It was called the Autotiter, and was developed by a man named Tom Astle. I found a few sentences on Astle's company:

"Tomtec has succeeded since 1967 by working with its clients to help solve their liquid handling needs. From 1967 to 1981, the Company had essentially one employee, Tom Astle. From 1967 to 1971, the Company operated as Astec, Inc. In 1971 the Company's name was changed to Tomtec, and incorporated. Tom Astle has been the President and CEO since that time. In 1967, Tomtec developed the Autotiter. This automated what were then the manual microtiter techniques. The primary market was serology and virology. The original instruments were an essential element of Smith Kline's rubella vaccine program." (Photos of the original patent filing below.)

- In 1986, Beckman gets into the microplate automation space. They release the Biomek 1000 and mark it as a "fast and accurate...robotic workstation" that sits on a scientist's bench, "takes over tedious manual tasks and integrates the work of four different instruments." I found these details in a Beckman ad, which was published in a 1987 issue of the "Journal of Automatic Chemistry." Photos below.

The Beckman device looks fully modern; it could even connect to an IBM computer so scientists could program new methods on it. I couldn't find a launch price, but the device was similar to the Zymark Zymate, and that device cost about $35,000 when it released in the 1980s, which would be equivalent to hundreds of thousands of dollars today.

[Dan Hightower @Danhightower]

Daycare calls me. That's never good.

For them.

Daycare: "your son hurt his elbow and won't move his arm. Can you come take him to a doctor's office?"

Me (ex Special Forces Medic): "A real doctor is on the way to you now. I am 6 mikes out. Alert me of status changes."

I arrive at daycare. I locate the patient. 21 month old male. Scene is not safe. I drag the patient to cover and concealment behind a seesaw, away from the other small terrorists in the AO.

I begin my assessment. Blood sweep negative for massive hemorrhage. Mental status: conscious and verbal but confused (answers "dada" when asked for blood type). One breath every 2 seconds. Bilateral rise and fall of the chest. Strong carotid pulse, strong bilat radial pulse.

Teeth and tongue intact no blood no mucus no dip or foreign objects. Eyes PERRLA, negative JVD/trach deviation, C-spine intact upon palpation.

Heart sounds strong upon auscultation. Percussion negative for hemo-T. Abdominal quads normal upon palpation. Pelvis negative for book sign.

Arms and legs negative for crepitus. However, Patient indicates discomfort in right arm upon palpation and supination/flexion of the elbow.

Nursemaid's elbow.

I begin interventions. Supination/flexion technique complete at 1215. Palpable clunk on successful reduction. I write the time on his chest in Sharpie. I tape a popsicle to his hand and tell the patient to suck but do not bite/chew. I write "1 x popsicle (10g sugar)" on his chest in Sharpie.

I reassess the patient after performing interventions then package the patient for handoff to daycare/higher level of care. I yell at daycare over the Blackhawk in my head: "21 month old male!!! Nursemaids elbow!!! Treated with supination/flexion technique at 1215!!! Patient has 1 x popsicle onboard!!"

Daycare: "sir please leave."

Me: "you should have called my wife."