Keep a light on

Good morning Staker! Here’s what’s cookin’ today: Airline profits expected to be cut in half amid surging fuel costs; A new treatment protocol reduces melanoma risk by nearly 50%; and Rush picks up right where they left off!

Let’s get into it!

Toronto is one of two Canadians cities hosting the FIFA World Cup, and though six games are slated to be played there, one British family has a trip planned that cost about $10,000 without even buying tickets.

“Twenty years ago, I went to the World Cup in Germany for my 40th birthday, and I had such a great time going to the Fan Fests,” said Nathan Richardson of Peterborough, England. “So when this one came around, my family thought it would be a great present to go over to Toronto.”

There aren’t many cheap places to go if the place is hosting the world’s biggest event, so Richardson was keen on picking the one he thought his family would enjoy the most.

“Toronto looks like an amazing city. I’ve never been there. My kids have never been there. But just in a bit of research, it looks like a fantastic place.”

While they’re hoping to get last minute tickets to one of the two games that are being played during the week they’re in Toronto, Richardson said they’re also happy to just hang out at the FIFA Fan Fest at Toronto’s Bentway Park, located just minutes from Toronto Stadium (usually known as BMO Field).

The tournament is expected to generate billions for the city in real dollars, but immeasurably greater value in cultural swagger for years to come thereafter.

OpenAI is believed to be completely overhauling its marquee product, with one senior staffer at the company brazenly telling the Financial Times “ChatGPT is dead.”

Like most AI hypergrowth machines, OpenAI is buried in an almost unimaginable pile of capital debt, having taken loans and investments from anyone willing to take a ride on the rocket ship to worldwide AI adoption.

However, while ChatGPT was the first, it may also have been mistakenly positioned out of the gate, with the company initially building it for direct-to-consumer use, rather than as an enterprise-level solution.

OpenAI’s Codex coding app has been targeting big businesses for a while now, offering businesses subscriptions that allow client administrators to issue tokens for employee use.

Costs are much higher for plans at this level, and they act as big chunks of recurring and predictable revenue for the service provider.

Anthropic is ahead of OpenAI in this realm, and with many believing the final stretch towards an IPO is on the horizon, both will be sprinting towards major recurring revenue streams to underpin the offering of a publicly traded stock.

A study published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by researchers at the New York University Perlmutter Cancer Center found the combined use of cancer vaccine intismeran and the immunotherapy pembrolizumab (Keytruda) reduced the risk of recurring skin cancer and death by 49%.

The study involved 107 patients, each of whom were given the combination after being randomly selected post-melanoma surgery. The study results were compared with a previous study that chose 50 patients to just receive Keytruda.

The key to the use of intismeran is that the vaccine is tailored individually—its messengers are derived from genetic information extracted from the recipient’s own tumor.

The trial found 68.8% of participants had no signs of recurring cancer, compared to just 49.1% from the previous study in which patients only received Keytruda.

“This means that adding intismeran to pembrolizumab reduced the risk for recurrence or death by 49 percent. The combination therapy also reduced the risk of distant metastasis—the spread of cancer to another part of the body—by 59 percent,” the study authors’ statement read.

“Overall survival, meaning no death from cancer or any other cause, was 92.2 percent for the vaccine with immunotherapy group, while for the immunotherapy-alone group it was 71.3 percent.”

The last show Rush played with Neil Peart was on Aug. 1, 2015 at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles, so it was only fitting that the band’s reunion tour would kick off at the same venue.

Alex Lifeson and Geddy Lee were joined by fill-in drummer Anika Nilles for the show the other night. It didn’t take long for Geddy to let everyone in on all sorts of Neil Peart-related stories.

"We're here for so many reasons," he said a few songs in. "We're here to celebrate over 50 years of music that [Alex Lifeson], myself and the great Neil Peart made together. We're here to pay tribute to Neil."

A video tribute was played featuring Peart shortly after Geddy spoke—one of several that played throughout the evening.

"Drumming became an instrument of self-esteem for me," Peart said, reflecting on his wide-eyed aspirations as a child. "I consider my whole career to be a reflection of me at 16 and what my values were. And what I thought the idea of artistic integrity was and what it should be devoted to."

In yet another nod to their departed friend and primary lyricist, the band played Time Stand Still, the 1987 single featuring vocalist Aimee Mann, who was also brought out to perform with the band for the first time ever.

"Please, a round of applause for Aimee Mann," Lee requested of the audience. "Coming out here to make this night, to honor Neil and make it special."

One dollar, Bob

Come on down! We’re throwin’ it back to classic game shows with today’s trivia 😎