Two decades
inside the web
as it kept rewriting
itself.
I’m Jason, a hosting industry insider with experience across open-source CMS platforms, control panels, cloud infrastructure, and the events that bring the industry together. Today, I focus on building partnerships, programming industry summits, and documenting what is happening across the hosting ecosystem.
- Jul 19, 2026
Forced Updates and the Gravity of Version 7.0.2
WordPress triggered the 'forced' update switch for version 7.0.2, and in the hosting world, that means it's time to watch the logs and stay alert.
Read more→ - Jul 19, 2026
WordPress Core Flaws and the Reality of ‘Set It and Forget It’
A new unauthenticated RCE in WordPress core reminds us that even when you do everything right, the codebase remains a moving target for global botnets.
Read more→ - Jul 17, 2026
When Ransomware Spills the Milk
Coca-Cola's Fairlife production shutdown serves as a cold reminder that digital security is now a physical supply chain requirement.
Read more→
The early 2000s were the good years for tinkerers. Open-source CMS platforms were the closest thing we had to a universal starter kit, and PHP-Nuke and osCommerce were how you learned to ship real projects on the open web. I went deep on Joomla for the better part of a decade, contributing code to the project, organizing its community around releases and events, and eventually crossing over into the WordPress orbit that quietly swallowed everything in its path.
From there the story is a tour of the hosting stack: cPanel and the control-panel era that defined shared hosting, the managed cloud wave at Cloudways and DigitalOcean, and the publishing side at webhosting.today. Day to day now I'm at JetBackup, working on backup and disaster recovery and helping hosts protect the infrastructure that keeps everything running. I also program the seasonal industry summits, Atlas Digital Summit and Domain Days Dubai, where the hosting community gathers to set the agenda for what comes next.
The through-line is community, the conferences, the hallway conversations, and the group chats where the industry actually decides what happens next. The technology changes; the people pointing it in the right direction stay the same.
Twenty-something years,
in reverse.
- 2026 – present
FounderAtlas Digital SummitPrivate gatherings for hosting leaders, AI infrastructure innovators, and the builders of the agentic web.
- 2026 – presentFounderConf64
The Conference Operating System for Business Development and Field Marketing Teams.
- 2026 – present
Co-FounderSuperDeployThe advanced migration engine for AI applications. Seamlessly transition your codebase to independent, production-grade infrastructure in minutes.
- 2025 – 2026Director of Business Developmentwebhosting.today
Contract · Business development and partnerships for the hosting publisher.
- 2024 – presentBusiness Development & Partnerships ManagerJetBackup
Backup and disaster recovery for the hosting ecosystem.
- 2023 – present
Chief Marketing Officer, Founding TeamDomain Days DubaiMENA’s domain and digital asset conference.
- 2021 – 2023Senior Manager, WordPress Business Unit → Lead Community Marketing Manager IICloudways / DigitalOcean
Full-time · WordPress community, field marketing, and sales enablement through the acquisition.
- 2019 – 2021Marketing ManagercPanel
Full-time · Event planner and marketing strategist for 500–3,000 attendee events and virtual series.
- 2017 – 2019FounderCMS Summit
The global CMS conference.
- 2007 – 2019CEO | FounderJoomlaxtc.com / Monev Software LLC
Premium Joomla templates and extensions. 101,000+ members.
- 2015 – 2019Board Member, Capital Team ChairJoomla! Project
Leadership, sponsorships, and partnerships for the open-source CMS.
- 2001 – 2005DeveloperPHP-Nuke · osCommerce era
First shipping code in the early open-source web.
Threat Brief: WordPress 7.0.2 Security Release & Pre-Auth RCE Exploitation
WordPress Core Critical Vulnerabilities
WordPress has released version 7.0.2 to address two major security flaws: a critical Unauthenticated Remote Code Execution (RCE) and a high-severity SQL Injection [1], [9]. These vulnerabilities, designated as CVE-2026-60137 and CVE-2026-63030, impact the REST API and the core framework without requiring authentication or specific preconditions [1], [6], [7].
Actively Exploited Plugin Flaws
- Gravity SMTP: Hackers are actively exploiting a flaw in this plugin to harvest sensitive data, including API keys and OAuth credentials [5].
- WordPress Social Login and Register: A high-priority privilege escalation vulnerability (version <= 7.7.0) allows unauthenticated attackers to bypass authentication and achieve administrator account takeover [10].
Ecosystem Vulnerability Volume
The WordPress ecosystem saw a massive influx of disclosures this week, with over 267 vulnerabilities identified across 222 plugins and 6 themes [3]. Another report highlights 250 vulnerabilities in 181 plugins, specifically spotlighting a critical "Missing Authorization" flaw leading to unauthenticated exposure of sensitive information [4].
Infrastructure & Mitigation
Cloudflare has deployed WAF protections to mitigate the core RCE and SQL injection risks [1]. Infrastructure teams are urged to update instances to WordPress 7.0.2 immediately, as the core team delayed disclosure for a week to allow for coordinated patching [2]. In broader infrastructure news, a pre-authentication RCE was also discovered in ServiceNow sandboxes, permitting full compromise of instances and proxy servers [8].
On the
road.
Conferences, summits, and WordCamps I’ll be at in the months ahead.
- Aug 16 – 19, 2026
- Sep 28 – 29, 2026
- Domain Days DubaiRescheduled
New dates to be announced.
Oct 15 – 16, 2026 - Nov 11 – 12, 2026
- State of the WordDec 2026
- Mar 15 – 18, 2027
When the servers
go quiet.
A small digital label putting out industrial house, progressive house, and dubstep. A different kind of open protocol.
Twenty years of showing up for the projects, communities, and voices that keep the open web open.
A news portal covering the hosting and domain industry — and a running excuse to keep talking to the people who build it.