The Oracle WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 26, 2015 I VOL. 53 NO. 3
Inside this Issue
The Index
News.................................................................1 Lifestyle......................................................4 Opinion.......................................................6
www.usforacle.com
classifieds..............................................7 Crossword.........................................7 sports............................................................8
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA
Share-A-Bull bikes to improve cross-campus commuting By Grace Hoyte E D I T O R
LI F E STYLE
Essential apps to download for the new school year. Page 4
Montage
S PORTS Quarterback overcomes difficult journey to become starter. BACK
The Share-A-Bull program, which is set to launch this fall, is going to have a pre-launch event today at Bull Market. Those who attend will be encouraged to download the app for the service. SPECIAL TO THE ORACLE
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The Campus Recreation Center will soon have another service to provide to students, but this time, no one will have to trek across campus to reach the building. In collaboration with the USF Center for Urban Transportation Research (CUTR) and Social Bicycles, the Rec Center will soon unveil Share-A-Bull, a bike rental program that will eliminate the need for students to flock to the Outdoor Recreation office every day. The program, originally pioneered by Yu Zhang, a professor in the College of Engineering, consists of 100 bikes placed around campus. “(Zhang) wanted to do some research around alternative transportation around campus,” said Francis Morgan, assistant director of Outdoor Recreation. Zhang submitted a proposal for the bike-sharing program to the Student Green Energy Fund in collaboration with the Rec Center.
“We have infrastructure, we have vehicles, we have people who know how to fix bikes, to operate the system,” Morgan said. The program will be available to students to unlock and ride for free for up to two hours each day. Each bike will be equipped with a computer that requires a passcode from the corresponding mobile app to unlock. When someone registers for an account, they will be required to put in a form of payment, but only as a means of paying fees incurred by misuse of the bikes. And the program isn’t only for students, as Morgan said faculty and staff can also use the program. Morgan has worked together with Zhang and CUTR in developing the program, and he said using the bikes is very simple. “People are going to download the app, and once they’re registered … they’ll just sign in with their single sign-on, just like they do with anything else on campus,” he said. “When they go in, if they want a
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USF course to pilot first open-access e-textbook By Russell Nay A S S T .
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The day when students are no longer required to pay hundreds of dollars each semester for textbooks and course materials may finally be on the horizon. During his recent fall address to faculty, USF Provost Ralph Wilcox announced that the students enrolled in professor Jennifer Schneider’s Literature in Childhood Education course
will use an open-access e-textbook to read digital literature collections, move through interactive lessons and visit children’s literature museums. “If we can find a way to reduce the cost of textbooks for students and engage them more fully in the learning process, students of this generation, I think, are going to be all the more successful,” Wilcox said in an interview. Schneider, an associate professor in the College of
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College of Business expected to receive another large donation By Alex Rosenthal M A N A G I N G
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The year of 2015 is a good one for fundraising at USF. After receiving record donations in the past year as part of the $1 billion Unstoppable campaign, the university announced Tuesday afternoon that another “significant announcement” will be made Thursday regarding the Muma College of Business. Though the email from a university spokesperson did not provide much insight into to
what the announcement will be, it stated the announcement will be made at 3:15 p.m. in the Muma College of Business Atrium, and will include USF President Judy Genshaft, USF Foundation CEO Joel Momberg and College of Business Dean Moez Limayem. The email also referenced the previous donation from Pam and Les Muma in October, a $25 million gift to rename the college — the single largest individual gift in university history — and Lynn Pippenger in February, which was a $10
million donation renaming the School of Accountancy. Before the series of donations for Tampa’s College of Business, entrepreneur Kate Tiedemann made the then-largest gift in school history by donating $10 million to rename USF St. Petersburg’s College of Business last September. A more recent donation to the Unstoppable campaign was USF trustee and alumnus Jordan Zimmerman’s gift to rename the School of Advertising and Mass Communications in the College of Arts and Sciences.
Barbie to return from Cuba soon, congressman to make announcement By Grace Hoyte E D I T O R
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The family and friends of Barbara Jimenez, a USF senior who has been stuck in Cuba since her near-fatal car accident Aug. 3, may have something to celebrate after today’s news conference. Though Jimenez is a U.S. citizen, she does not have health insurance. When she needed to be airlifted from Cuba, no company would agree for less than tens of thousands of dollars. Her sister, Caridad, said the Cuban hospital was of little help in finding a way to get her sister home. In fact, she added only
when she returned stateside did people offer her advice and suggestions. “Communications proved difficult,” she said. “We were getting a lot of misinformation … I don’t know if it was out of fear of having us worry. Then we would get a call an hour later (saying) ‘They’re all in a coma.’” After Caridad arrived in Cuba and saw her sister’s condition, she was quoted a figure of $50,000 for airlifting the 22-year-old back. Needless to say, Caridad said their parents, “middle class, blue-collar people,” don’t have $50,000 to hand over to an air ambulance company. In an effort to raise money
for the service, Jimenez’s sorority, Lambda Theta Alpha, started a Facebook event and a GoFundMe page. Currently, the effort has raised over $16,000 from more than 400 donors. A press conference will be held today in the Marshall Student Center at 12:30 p.m. regarding Jimenez’s situation. Congressman David Jolly is expected to be in attendance and share news with the Jimenez family. According to the Tampa Metro Bugle, Jolly is slated to release news that “a Bay area air ambulance company has offered to bring Jimenez home free of charge.”
BIKES
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Share-a-Bull bike … once they sign in, they’ll have a six-digit account number with Social Bicycles, it’ll be on the top of their screen on the mobile app.” Once in the app, students, faculty and staff can reserve a bike anywhere around campus. However, once they reserve the bike, their time starts running, and they have 10 minutes to find and unlock it. “(The user) can log in from the app or the website,” said Crystal Bissada, communications and marketing specialist at the Rec Center. “You reserve it, go online. You’ll get a code on your phone and you enter it into the keypad on the back of the bike. That will release the bike. Then, take it wherever you want, then return it.” When the program launches later in the fall, students interested in using the bikes will have to download the Social Bicycles app for their smartphones. Within the app, a map of USF and the surrounding area shows where available bikes are at any given time. Additionally, students can find out where hubs are around campus, and where there may be a bike locked outside of a hub, which is a popular destination around campus where the bikes should be locked in order to maintain steady usage of each. It is very important for students to remember to lock up the bikes in hubs, as locking up at a public bike rack will run up a $5 charge on the student’s Social Bicycles account. The app is free to download and an account is free to create, but fees of varying prices will be charged to the account for a number of infractions. After the daily two free hours of riding time, $5 will
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be charged per hour, up to $25 each day. Additionally, $5 will be charged to one’s account for locking a bike and logging out of the computer outside of a hub location. Most significantly, a $50 charge will be processed for locking a bike and logging out of the computer outside of the system area, which spans the campus and several nearby locations, including University Mall. “They’re invisible lines on the map, (and) they’ll be on the map,” Bissada said. “Essentially, if you’re on campus, Cooper will be a hub, the Library will be a hub (and) Campus Rec will be a hub.” USF is not alone in the bikesharing project. Santander Bank sponsors a bike share program in London, and Vancouver has a similar system. The program, which is set to launch this fall, is going to have a pre-launch event today at Bull Market. Those who attend will be encouraged to download the app and learn more about the program. There will be free food and a raffle for gas cards, as well as free T-shirts. Though the program is new, Morgan is hopeful for its future. “We’re hoping that, the way campus runs, we’ll have to do very little moving bikes around in the middle of the night so they’re where they need to be in the morning,” he said. If all goes according to the plan, USF will add 200 more bikes over the next few years, which Morgan said will be a suitable number to meet the needs of the USF Tampa campus. He, Bissada and their team are eager for the bikes to arrive on campus. “It’s been two years in the making, so it will be nice to have it on campus,” Morgan said.
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BOOKS
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Education, said her online class’s e-textbook originally began as a proposal to the Textbook Affordability Project (TAP). TAP, focused on providing students and faculty with alternatives to full-priced textbooks, is a service of the USF Library, which partnered with USF Innovative Education to develop a digital openaccess textbook program and Schneider’s resulting e-textbook. “I was pretty excited that USF is doing this,” Schneider said. “It seems to be pretty cutting edge for a university to do this kind of work.” Perhaps the feature of the e-textbook most immediately
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noticeable to students is its cost. Schneider said the book, being open access, is completely free. She said students would normally have to pay anywhere from $80 to $120 for a hard copy. “Because textbooks are so expensive, many students can’t get them,” she said. “When things are open-access, the information is readily available and free.” Unlike most traditional textbooks, Schneider said her class’s e-textbook will be very visual and highly interactive, employing the use of educational videos and Internet links to more easily display course content. Whereas students would normally have to research static references in a paper textbook, she said they can travel directly to a Web page instead.
Schneider said the book is also unique because it was written with USF students in mind. She said she was thinking very specifically about the students who would be taking her course when she wrote the e-textbook. “It’s very targeted toward them, but it’s also broad enough that other people would be able to use it in other universities,” she said. “The tone, the content and the scope of the book is written with (USF) students in mind. I wrote like I would speak to them if we were all together.” Schneider said there are drawbacks to open-access e-textbooks, however. She said other instructors looking to use these books in their classes should be comfortable with the free use of their intellectual property, as Schneider’s text-
book will be free to her class and available for download at USF’s Scholar Commons. Schneider said e-textbooks are also generally more difficult to produce than traditional textbooks, as she feels it is more work to think not only in written language but in visual language and then combine the two. “It does require a lot more effort, but the outcome is really beneficial to the student because it makes the content much more interesting,” she said. Wilcox said the implementation of the e-textbook in Schneider’s class marks the departure of USF’s digital open-access textbook program from its pilot phase, and he said more e-textbooks for additional classes will be developed this fall.
“Some of our more innovative faculty are starting to recognize the utility of technology in enhancing student learning,” he said. “Hopefully we’ll get some takers in the College of Arts and Sciences in large general education courses where students have to, at the moment, pay outlandish prices for books.” Regarding how the book is being funded without students purchasing it, Schneider said the book is a provost-funded initiative, but said she could not divulge any further details on costs or funding. Schneider said the e-textbook is still in its early prototype stage, and developers are currently deciding whether the book should be downloadable or take another format like a cloud-based application.
Battle canoes
As part of Week of Welcome, the Campus Recreation Center hosted “Rec the Night” late Tuesday evening. During the event, students participated in various games and sports including “Battle Canoes,” in which teams of students competed against one another in the indoor pool and used buckets of water to try and sink each other’s canoes. ORACLE PHOTO/ ASH JANNASCH
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Apps every USF student should have By Moneer Kheireddine L I F E S T Y L E
busiest of students.
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Canvas If you have ever taken a lecture course, you have almost certainly forgotten at least one piece of equipment. Nothing is more frustrating than walking from Kappa Hall to the University Lecture Hall through the rain or the blazing sun just to remember your iClicker or your notebook for that morning’s class are still in the residence hall. It is now easier than ever to keep ahead of the curve and remain organized in class. Several apps are free to purchase on the iPad, iPhone and computer that can make life much easier for even the
This may seem like a no-brainer, but many people don’t know Canvas is a downloadable app. With the app, students can check each of their classes without the hassle of using a browser. With a few quick clicks you can check on assignments, view documents or track progress in any of your classes.
Dropbox Dropbox is useful for storing all of your files through a database seamlessly between your phone and your computer. Easily store class assignments,
photos or any tools you may need for academic success.
MyUSF The MyUSF app is another extremely useful yet widely underutilized resource. The app boasts a campus directory, includes information about on campus bus routes, shows how many BullBucks are available to each respective user, gives insight into USF social activity and reveals what times the dining locations on campus are open. It’s an invaluable app for any college student.
Reef Polling iClickers are expensive. It would be much simpler use
a phone to answer questions instead of one. That’s where the Reef Polling app comes in. It allows students to answer questions with a phone instead of purchasing an expensive and eventually useless iClicker. Students should check with their teacher to ensure that they allow the usage of the app.
Khan Academy This app allows access to small lessons on a range of topics from many different studies, especially STEM majors. It is free to use and a great resource for a variety of subjects.
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USF coach Willie Taggart on Flowers’ demeanor: “You can’t let anybody see you sweat, and you don’t ever see him sweat.” ORACLE FILE PHOTO/ADAM MATHIEU
FLOWERS
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Nathaniel was telling him. His mind couldn’t wrap itself around what his ears were hearing. His proudest moment was collapsing around him. “What do you mean?” Flowers remembered asking. “He got shot in the head,” Nathaniel explained. Brad Holt was Flowers’ 24-year-old half-brother. On Nov. 13, according to the Miami Herald, Holt noticed a yellow Ford Mustang driving recklessly in front of his apartment complex. Fearing for the safety of several children playing near the car, Holt called out to the driver, yelling for him to slow down. A short time later, Miami-Dade Police said the car’s driver returned to the complex and shot Holt, who was pronounced dead upon arriving at Jackson Memorial Hospital. Flowers was crushed. “That just left a bad taste in my mouth,” he said. “The last word I got from my brother (was), ‘Whatever the coaches do, let them teach you because that’s why they’re there. Take the opportunity.’ And that’s the last thing I got from him.” Word about the tragedy quickly spread to the team. Sophomore running back
Marlon Mack said the team did its best to rally around him. “We talked to him every day to make sure he was all right,” Mack said. “Whenever he was feeling down and needed someone to talk to him, he would text us or one of us would call him and come around and help him out to try and keep his spirits up.” Taggart also knew about the situation, calling Flowers into his office to console his young signalcaller. Flowers reassured Taggart he could make the start. Nothing was going to take away what he worked to earn. Before a national-television audience, Flowers kept his word and started under center that Saturday at Gerald J. Ford Stadium. But, understandably, his mind was far from the field. On a 40-degree, rain-soaked night, Flowers struggled before being pulled early in the fourth quarter with the Bulls trailing 13-0. For the final 10 minutes or so, Flowers watched from the sideline as backup Mike White led USF to victory with two late touchdown passes. Though things didn’t go the way he wanted them to, Flowers earned newfound respect from his teammates. “He came out here, man, and he played his heart out,” former
receiver Andre Davis said. Second chance Flowers was given another chance to start this season, battling with senior Steven Bench through the spring and preseason camp to earn the nod. This time, he made it count. On Monday afternoon, Taggart announced Flowers will start the Bulls’ season opener against Florida A&M on Sept. 5. “I’m blessed, just a blessing,” Flowers said. “To come out here every day and work with these guys and compete, Coach T gave me an opportunity. … Steve came out, Steve worked every day, I worked every day, and I left it up to the coaches.” When Flowers takes the field as a starter at Raymond James Stadium, thousands of eyes will be focused on him, eager to see if he can finally be the quarterback USF has longed for since B.J. Daniels graduated in 2012. To Taggart, it’s nothing Flowers can’t handle. “You can’t let anybody see you sweat, and you don’t ever see him sweat,” Taggart said. “You don’t see his demeanor change. He’s been through it all. “I don’t think there’s anything that he can go through in football that’s going to get him down.”
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UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA
the Oracle the University of South Florida’s student newspaper since 1966
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Opinion Editor Breanne Williams oracleopinion@gmail.com Lifestyle Editor Moneer Kheireddine oraclelifestyleeditor@gmail.com Multimedia Editor Adam Mathieu Digital Editor Roberto Roldan Copy Editor Safeena Kassoo Assistant Editors Jacob Hoag Russell Nay Graphic Artists Ashley Barzaga Luke Blankenship Advertising Sales Lauren Alford Rachel Carpenter Abby Pereira Destiny Moore The Oracle is published Monday through Thursday during the fall and spring semesters, and twice weekly, Monday and Thursday, during the summer. The Oracle allocates one free issue to each student. Additional copies are $.50 each and available at the Oracle office (SVC 0002).
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Planned Parenthood scrutiny misguided
Editor in Chief Grace Hoyte oracleeditor@gmail.com
Sports Editor Jeff Odom oraclesportseditor@gmail.com
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Breanne Williams COLU M N I ST
The recent attack on Planned Parenthood has led to an intense scrutiny of the organization. Before the Senate, once again, is the issue of whether or not the government should fund the company. The Center for Medical Progress (CMP), an anti-abortion organization, filmed a group of Planned Parenthood officials at lunch discussing collecting fees for tissue from aborted fetuses. CMP, hoping to cause a stir large enough to attempt to keep all governmental funds from this organization, then leaked the video to the media. The group has released a total of eight videos in protest of the organization’s services. In response to the allegations, Planned Parenthood apologized for the tone of the conversations but insisted the videos had been edited to display a message the speakers had never intended. According to Planned Parenthood, officials were discussing the cost of transporting fetal tissue for medical research and in no way were implying that the tissues were being sold to the highest bidder. This past year, Planned Parenthood received $528.4 million in government funds and $305.3 million from nongovernment sources, according to the Washington Post. The organization states it uses the money from nongovernment sources to fund its abortion services. While anti-abortion groups are constantly attacking Planned Parenthood over pro-
viding abortions, they fail to mention the plethora of other services offered by the company. Abortion only accounts for 3 percent of their services. Forty-two percent of funds go to STI/STD testing and treatment, 34 percent to contraception, 11 percent to other women’s health services, 9 percent to cancer screenings and prevention, 3 percent to abortion and 1 percent to other services, according to the Washington Post. Removing funding would mean the government would cease to assist in the many beneficial services offered by the organization. Planned Parenthood provides necessary and preemptive health care to women across the country, many of whom have low and moderate incomes. The fight against the organization will only prevent women from receiving the health care they need and otherwise may not be able to afford. Politicians are adopting a stand on this issue and using it to back their campaigns. While the topic of abortion has not been a stranger to past elections, it appears as if it will now be one of the primary contending platforms. What started as a vulgar media manipulation has turned into an issue many are using to advance in the polls. Pay attention to the remarks made by the presidential elects. For many, it seems the primary health care accessed by hundreds of thousands of women is something to be scourged from the budget paid for by taxpayers. Though the Senate voted down the budget cut, the opposing forces are relentless. This is not the first time citizens have called for the re-evaluation of funds towards this organization, and it will undoubtedly not be the last. Breanne Williams is a junior majoring in mass communications.
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What you said Opinion Editor Breanne Williams asked students about their favorite things to do on campus in their free time.
“Visit MSC. There are events and I am an international student and like meeting different types of people.” - Pardeep Kumar, a graduate student in electrical engineering
“Being involved with student organizations. It’s a great way to get involved on campus, meet new people and give back to your community.” - Anne Reule, a senior majoring in political science “Hang out in (Baptist Collegiate Ministry.) The people are welcoming and we do lots of activities together.” - Cynthia Curbelo, a senior majoring in secondary math education
“I like playing piano in the music building. It’s how I unwind and relax.” - Zak Whitney, a sophomore majoring in accounting
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‘He’s been through it all’
Two days after the shooting death of his half-brother last November, sophomore quarterback Quinton Flowers made his first collegiate start at SMU. ORACLE FILE PHOTO/ADAM MATHIEU Flowers exchanged pleasantries 2013. Branded a four-star prospect no matter what it is,” Flowers said. n Quinton Flowers with teammates, before taking out out of Miami Jackson High, Flowers “Even if she would tell me, ‘Get overcomes personal his phone to call and deliver the was widely considered one of the the remote off the dresser,’ I’d get best athletes in the nation by sever- there.” to his brother, Nathaniel. tragedies to lead USF news On the day his mother passed, As soon as Nathaniel answered, al recruiting services and received before he could utter a word, an countless offers from prestigious Flowers’ older sister Shanay called football. elated Flowers poured his heart programs such as Alabama, Florida and told him to come to the hosBy Jeff Odom pital as quickly as he could. Mans and Nebraska. out. S P O R T S E D I T O R But shielded behind his cur- didn’t have much time. She was ‘I’m just gonna do whatever I In what should have been the can,” Flowers recalled telling him. tain of accolades and versatility slipping away. Before he reached her bedside, under center, a long trail of calammost jovial moment of his young “Coach gave me the opportunity.” On the other end of the line, ity has loomed behind Flowers Nancy’s heart stopped beating. But life, Quinton Flowers scampered almost as if she could sense his off the practice field and hurried there was no celebration from since youth. When Flowers was 7, his father, presence, Flowers said his mother down the long corridor toward Nathaniel. There were no howls USF’s locker room, beaming from of jubilation — no signs of excite- Nathaniel Sr., was killed after being came back to life, wanting to see shot in the neck in front of the fam- her son one last time. ment. ear to ear. “She really died and came Instead, Nathaniel began to sob, ily’s home in Liberty City, a suburb On this Thursday afternoon back,” Flowers said. “I don’t know of Miami. Flowers recalled. last November, the true freshman Then, entering his senior year how. But said she just wanted to “What’s wrong?” Flowers asked. had just been informed by coach “Brad just got shot,” Nathaniel at Miami Jackson, Flowers’ mother, see me. I was the only one she Willie Taggart that he won a weekNancy Mans, passed away after a didn’t see. replied through his tears. long quarterback competition and “The last words she told me battle with cancer. would be suiting up two days later The loss was particularly chal- was, ‘Keep going, keep fighting.’” ‘Keep going, keep fighting’ under the lights in Dallas for his And just like that, she was gone. lenging for Flowers. The youngest first collegiate start against SMU. Before signing with USF last of five siblings, Flowers did all he For Flowers, a lifetime of workDream overshadowed ing and fantasizing about this February, Flowers built quite the could for her. “No matter where I’m at, I chance had finally become reality resume as a prep star, rising to Flowers couldn’t believe what become one of South Florida’s could be 10 blocks away, I’d run — he made it. to her and see what she wanted finest dual-threat quarterbacks in n See FLOWERS on PAGE 5 Once inside the locker room,
Football
Linebackers suspended first two games By Jeff Odom S P O R T S
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USF will be without two veteran linebackers for its first two games this season. Senior Tashon Whitehurst and junior Nigel Harris will be forced to sit out the opener against Florida A&M on Sept. 5 and the first road game at Florida State on Sept. 12 after both were suspended Tuesday for violating unspecified team rules during the spring semester. Harris, a former Hillsborough High standout, set a school record and led the nation with six forced fumbles last season. He was expected to challenge Whitehurst (49 tackles in 2014) for the starting spot at inside linebacker. Coach Willie Taggart expressed disappointment in Harris and Whitehurt’s actions, but said he is confident the team has enough depth to fill their void. Redshirt freshman Jimmy Bayes — rated a four-star recruit by Rivals.com — senior C.J. Garye and freshman Danny Thomas are candidates to replace them, Taggart said. “Those guys are going to have to work their butt off to get back and come back and play and earn the job back,” Taggart said. “I think that’s the beauty of going out and recruiting and having some depth to where you can go play. “Our guys also understand there’s a standard that we’re going to have around here. It’s a culture that we’re creating and you’ve got to live up to it, or there will be consequences when you don’t.”