Fortress Of Freedom Board

[Maurice Ali]

FOFSTOCK 2:




FOFSTOCK !



So we are going to get some estimates for FOFSTOCK 2 “Lite” from Sankofa Square. Don’t get too excited as after the Central Park application - interest basically dropped off. Case in point: When we went ahead with the first FOFSTOCK all of our stable was active and excited. Some even started documentaries of their own for the event, no such interest now. But we will take a look at the costs and see where everybody stands on the new offers. Basically we should have one for Canada Day and one for a non- statutory holiday. So that’s where things stand right now on FOFSTOCK 2.




On event day everyone wants a piece of you - but it is fun! !



Taxes:



Never ending tax returns and FOF Entertainment has one this month. Maybe I can do it this morning…..




Personal Life:



Buying groceries and glad most of the road I have to use have finally cleared of snow and ice!



Like I said, uncertainty like economic uncertainty opens opportunities for a guy like me for things like FOFSTOCK 2. Geo-political uncertainty opens opportunities for me with our advocacy - but - it is still opportunities in uncertain times. My companies run on vapours and will be unaffected, all the money is still in the war chest for concerts and music festivals. That is why we can do things others can’t.




My Fender Jaguar - no buyers remorse!



Also, Fender is telling its distributors there will be cost increases due to tariffs starting March 25 (2025). I’m so glad I got that Jaguar and can forget about buying more guitars now…..





Goodnight…..





https://youtu.be/kyU2pGWA6Jc?si=sqQkrOo6g27vSx9D

[Maurice Ali]

The corporate taxes for FOF Entertainment are done!



In my “new world order” FOF is the intellectual repository of creative works until all the other orgs have fully settled in. FOF is also a news service. International Archiving of Independent Journalists Inc. is still around and archives journalists and runs things like the iaij.com forums - if people have issues with our articles, they sue this corporation and not IAIJ. So FOF handles everything IAIJ does minus the advocacy at the UN if need be.



FOF Entertainment is the all-in-one private corporation that can do all forms of entertainment but is not a not-for-profit.



More Vision is an advertising company and app dev corporation.



So, as I send corporations off to live on their own, I can still do everything I could before - minus the advocacy although https://fortressoffreedom.org can do some - just not as a not-for-profit. Actually I should do the same with https://fofentertainment.org (just checked and already done!) to cover all bases.



In other news:







I’m still using Graphene OS on my backup Pixel and added some web based social media just to make it more livable. I actually can function with this phone as it is now. True privacy phones are never ideal as a normal phone and OS are, but I can live with this to the extent that I don’t want Google Android anymore as I’m not missing out enough to make me want to go through the hassle of changing back - That was the “acid test” on the privacy OS phone.




Goodnight…..

[Maurice Ali]

Back to working on the Consultative Status application for FOFSTOCK. I now have to time to do this.




Our application for Consultative Status at the United Nations!



Also, stuff around the house. That clogged kitchen sink for example. Just have a normal weekend! Take it easy - what’s wrong with that.







I’m actually going to enjoy this. Maybe wash the Mustang…..




Goodnight…..





https://youtu.be/F2a2I1eXbIs?si=7uE0NCHcVD-cs0mA

[Maurice Ali]

Wow, things are getting done!



I made it to the end of the consultative status application and now it’s just to go over it a few times and make improvements. FOFSTOCK now looks the part and ready to take on the world!



I know, this sounds boring but creating an effective NGO is hard. Even though this is easier the second time around, it is still hard. But the weekend got a lot of stuff done at FOFSTOCK!



In other news:



The weather is nice so I’ll take advantage of it.




Me clearing out the weeds as first born!



Start cleaning up the cars and the usual. Then take care of the house. My house is really an investment r property I have lived in for 34 years. If I have to I can live out my days here but my parents wanted me to keep the larger family house down the road. That should happen in the end but until then I stay in my present house. You just never know, and me and the rest of the family have to have that guarantee of a home, so home improvements are taking place as spring settles in. Actually, home improvements at both houses so that is alway a pain for me personally.



What’s that term again - “first born” - that means that in the end all family matters ultimately rest with you. As far as I can see, every culture has this thing embedded in the culture. It is what it is…..




Goodnight…..





https://youtu.be/bQy2tISWQQ0?si=UfuBDmQBeDcKmMUe

[Maurice Ali]

A successful weekend…..



I finally feel it in my bones that FOFSTOCK is finally ready to go forth into the world and do its thing! I like the fact it has FOF Records by its side to help members get out there and serve as examples in advocacy. I was kind of wondering what the future was for the record label and now it has a future with FOFSTOCK!



You have to feel the pride in creating an organization and populating it with people. Something that will carry on without you. All I ask is a photo of me - its founder - somewhere in the office. It can be hanging on the wall crooked - I don’t care - but I want the truth about who started all this to be there on display. No resting on past events or successes, the past accomplishments only mean something in an obituary. FOFSTOCK is happening now and that is where the attention must be.



The consultative status at the United Nations got worked on to the end of the application. It will be submitted before the deadline in June. This may take years but getting most of the work there done this week was a major accomplishment.




A playbook and Blackberry Torch!



Other things happened. Like a dead MacBook M1. Would not turn on! I thought it was dead as in broken but it actually was drained in the battery and took like 30 minutes just to show the low battery icon on the screen. But it came back. I charged up all my devices after that. The Blackberry Playbook was also dead but came back. I checked things out in terms of apps. AOL and the NFB actually started loading and stalled. The browser worked enough to bring up FOF and these forums. YouTube loads and shows the videos in search but playback stalled.







The Blackberry Passport was cool! A square cellphone - and it won design awards for that! In New York people would sneak sideways glances at in on the street. I gave my first speech at the UN in front of the NGO Committee for consultative status reading it off the Passport as citizen journalists did their journalism on cellphones. The UN at that time was all Blackberry and it was not on sale in the States yet - so this moment was super cool! Back at home - a crowd would gather at offices to check out my phone as I was one of the first to get it - like I said - a super cool moment! At my parent’s place a friend of my sister yelled “That’s a Passport” as the phone was intriguing.



I was one of the first to pay with a cellphone back in 2015 in September using the Blackberry. That cashier at a Swiss Chalet scoffed at it happening and then shock and despair as it worked and she stated that her job will ultimately be replaced. It took like 10 years but she was sort of right. It took years for Android Pay and Apple Pay to become real - But Blackberry was there first - also with hand gestures on the Passport. Lest we forget!


The Blackberry Passport still works but app support is limited. This phone is eleven years old and still looks cool! It will still work in Canada but probably not in the States. The legacy free security suite Blackberry let me use finally got turned off late last year. It was a good run with Blackberry. They still exist but not in the cellphone space - that was yesterday’s news…..



For Monday I mail out the corporate taxes for FOF Entertainment. Maybe wash the salt off the cars. Spring is coming - finally…..




Goodnight…..





https://youtu.be/p1t0qnNk4Y0?si=iuF_BJJirxsoSyBH

[Maurice Ali]

Tuesday has me headed to the office as none of my credit cards will go through to pay for the rent. This has happened before and is always a pain. The card company says everything is good at their end. Anyway, I should be able to pay it in person with one of the receptionists and be done with it.




Sue at FOFSTOCK!



On the weekend I updated FOFSTOCK information with Corporations Canada. The first one was to highlight the advocacy aspect of FOFSTOCK in its corporate description. I did that on the weekend but didn’t follow the proper formula, so I had to redo it on Monday and now that is done. At FOFSTOCK’s annual general meeting last December, we made Sue from IAIJ a director at FOFSTOCK. She was a part of the Punk scene in London back in the day in addition to helping at the label and the first FOFSTOCK. This gives us another beachhead presence in the UK, apart from Canada and the States and truly makes FOFSTOCK an international NGO. That is done and now we have five directors at FOFSTOCK!




The reception area a few years ago!



Anyway, back to the office to check for mail and pay their bill. Truth is my house is the office and studio and boardroom and canteen. The whole first floor is the reception, the audio booth and studio, off to the right is the storage room and bathroom and at the end is my office and the editing workstations. Upstairs is the conference room that was my dining room. The living room is the place to meet and greet staff and clients and the kitchen is the canteen. Then there is a lockable door that accesses three bedrooms with a bathroom where technically I live.



But for optics the formal address is four or five blocks up the road and I pay for that every month. This is no mailbox and we can rent as much office space as we wish on the fly. I do have a full time set of receptionists to handle stuff if I’m not there - but that is a rare occasion.



Anyway, it’s off to the office to pay a bill and say “hi”!




Goodnight…..



Goodnight…..

[Maurice Ali]

It’s all corporate right now.


First in the official announcement of the new Director at FOFSTOCK:

[Maurice Ali]

A busy day today.



A trade war is developing between Canada and the States. I only mention it as it affects my guitar stuff. So one of the places I used to hang out has called it quits and is closing for good. This one is Cosmo Music and will start a final sale next week and close doors for good a few weeks later.


Long&Mcquade (another music company) will then take over the building and will continue many aspects of the outgoing company after the retail stock is liquidated. This is just one of several companies on the margins that decided to just give in than wait out a year for more of tariffs. For Cosmo, they went into a huge building and had the largest in Canada and one of the largest music stores in North America. They always had drone shots of the place. and were proud of it. I believe it was the carrying costs of that place that put them under.



Cosmo was a family operation and sometimes the son will make mistakes when dad retired. In their farewell speech on video you again see a drone shot of the place. They even had a Starbucks inside the place before Covid. Long and McQuade is a national chain owned by the Long family and did it right with more frugality. Part of the building will be a store and the rest will be their head office that they were scouting before all of this.



Anyway this business philosophy runs counter to mine of low fixed costs. All my corporations are still in business!




Goodnight…..





https://youtu.be/467yWAm94IA?si=rqakyTUF31GTgL1E

[Maurice Ali]

Too much happening!



I sent off some advocacy to the CEO of Live Nation Entertainment.







Then FOFSTOCK made suggestions for WSIS+20. FOFSTOCK likes WSIS+20 and the ITU as it’s a part of the United Nations we can participate in and add to our resume. That stuff ends on March 14 so we slipped it in under the wire!







Then, FOFSTOCK got an invitation for the WSIS+20 HIGH Level Event in Geneva in late May!







More on the weekend as I’m too busy to expand on all this…..



All this is in preparation for our consultative application with the United Nations. Also, last Sunday we changed the official mission statement for the corporation (and cost me 200 dollars):


“Schedule / Annexe
Purpose Of Corporation / Déclaration d'intention de l'organisation

Replace "To promote musical artists and entertain the general public through a yearly music festival." with: To advocate for musicians and independent (indie) organizations worldwide with support for their freedom of expression through their music.”



So that happened last Sunday/Monday.





Goodnight…..





https://youtu.be/c8gBolNEYEA?si=t3yLqh10ziHZWL_p

[Maurice Ali]

I still have no time!







Saturday had me get everyone covid shots - really just for my 92 year old dad - but since I’m suing the Government for 3.8 billion dollars on age discrimination for inferior vaccines during the pandemic and not revaccinating with the better vaccines - it’s good optics to keep getting them until trial.







At 7:00pm on Friday, Apple emailed me and wants to call me on Monday about that letter I sent to Tim Cook regarding an artist’s right to change their stage name on songs they created. No, I won’t be talking to Tim Cook, but an actual person there at Apple and we shall see what happens. Why 7:00pm - it’s because it’s the west coast and they are hours behind - it’s all totally legit. I will be totally transparent and you will see how Apple Inc. operates just like I will.




Right now I’m at the closing Cosmos Music store and everything is 25% off. The only thing I could find interesting was a Fender American strat and Les Paul Standards. Those Les Pauls were super heavy! I had to think about it - but - in the end I will stick with my lighter Studio. I made my own single coil style strat from that el’cheapo Kramer so why bother with the American one? And that Helix I was looking at was not there. They did have a Helix Floor demo on display but could not sell it. So - nothing to buy - I should be happy but I’m not.



I really have to spend some time and take all you through all the nuances of what has happened these last few days. Really I just had no time and all I just want to do is nothing and maybe sleep. That is my life now…..




Goodnight…..





https://youtu.be/Iew56uQfnLs?si=pmM1j5PreEoLobxv

[Maurice Ali]

I’m still pissed off I didn’t find anything at the closing sale at Cosmo Music.




Actually my Les Paul looks pretty cool as is!



I wouldn’t mind upgrading that Studio Les Paul for a standard but then what do I do with the Studio I have, and the Les Paul’s they had left were all incredibly heavy. The only difference - really - is the binding, but the studio is the better playing guitar so I guess it stays.




My Kramer “partscaster” guitar!



That Fender strat purchase is more a reality. My crappy little 200 buck entry guitar was modded with Fender electronics and pickups and Wilkinson tuners into a decent playing guitar. I learned how to mod, repair and solder on that guitar and it look brand new! Plus, it was your first guitar. I could replace the thing but I’m not crazy about the idea.




It’s old but will do for now!



They had no Helix LT and I’m not rolling the dice on other brands so no go there. I’m kind of happy with things as they are but it is rare to have blanket discounts on everything in the store. You don’t have to compromise and can get anything you want - if it’s in stock. Still, the 25% odd is just a common discount. My SG Standard from that store was 30% off and no closing sale. I could get that same deal from Long&Mcquade if I waited. The urgency is t really there if you think things through.



Would I have bought anything if the close out sale didn’t exist? No - and there is your answer there. Not saying I would never up-grade, but the urgency is not there.



As for the orgs:



The Apple email now shows “encrypted” which is usual. We shall see what happens on Monday.




FOFSTOCK



Sankofa Square has not got beck to me with this pricing estimates - if anyone was curious.



We also have a bunch of updates to post.




Goodnight…..

[Maurice Ali]

That weekend was depressing…..



Maybe the rain - especially on Sunday - but the whole thing was a downer. Especially the guitar business - but more on that later.

[Maurice Ali]

FOFSTOCK and Apple Inc. management are now talking to each other. I just sent them some files and we shall see what happens. That’s all I’ll say for now.


In the meantime, here is a shot of Cosmo Music’s entrance I photographed on the weekend:









Later…..

[Maurice Ali]

I now move back to IAIJ and WSIS+20.



They extended open consultations till the 21st so we will do that for IAIJ pitching online journalist rights and freedoms and that worldwide vote. We also got registered for the High Level WSIS+20 meeting just like FOFSTOCK. After this I’ll take a break and relax a bit.







The weather is getting hot and the snow is gone, so I have to check things out around the houses. Then change the oil in the Mustang to a heavier weight. The Cosmo Music going out of business sale is mostly a done deal for me. Thank god I didn’t buy the expensive but heavy Les Paul! Gone now and that American strat is probably gone too. I survived the sirens call to buy something…..




Goodnight…..




https://youtu.be/MLS92TxTZQg?si=xqfC3g1nzE-SnzM6

[Maurice Ali]

A few things:



The IAIJ message board is back to being quick to use. It was lethargic for the longest time and I figured it was some user cohabitating our server and overloading things - or something more nefarious. But now it’s nice and quick and I thought most ever in the board was massive here between eight and nine hundred but at IAIJ on Feb 25 it was between 1300 and 1400! What up with that?







The open consultation with IAIJ should be done today and submitted. Probably nothing happens but getting the word out is what we do here - so…..



I was out and about with the family and popped into Cosmo Music - again. It was still 25% off and no new guitars. I looked again at the black Les Paul Standard which is really just my almost black Studio with binding - so I will pass! The vintage American strat is still there but I already have an SSS strat with Fender electronics - so pass…..



Same thing, different day, you all know the score…..




Goodnight…..