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 31, 2026
Closing the Identity Gap Between Humans and Machines
Okta’s $200M acquisition of Permiso highlights the growing challenge of securing non-human identities as AI agents move from experimental toys to production-grade enterprise tools.
Read more→ - Jul 31, 2026
The Registry Gold Rush Returns for Those with Deep Pockets
ICANN is finally opening the window for new gTLDs again, but the price of entry ensures this remains a game for the heavy hitters of the hosting world.
Read more→ - Jul 30, 2026
Scaling SMB Security Without Scaling the Workforce
Inforcer's $50M Series C proves that the massive gap between enterprise-grade security and SMB reality is the next big frontier for capital-backed growth.
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.
WP2Shell Core RCE and Critical Plugin Supply Chain Alerts
WP2Shell: Critical Core Vulnerabilities
- Overview: A vulnerability chain known as "wp2shell," comprising CVE-2026-63030 and CVE-2026-60137, allows unauthenticated Remote Code Execution (RCE) and full site takeover [2, 6].
- Impact: The flaw affects WordPress core, potentially impacting over 500 million websites [8]. Public exploits are now active in the wild [4].
- Remediation: WordPress has released an emergency security update (v.7.02) to address this chain [3, 10]. Infrastructure teams should prioritize immediate patching [1].
Plugin Supply Chain Attack
- Backdoor Detected: Wordfence PRISM identified a backdoored WordPress plugin within two hours of its introduction [7].
- Technical Details: The backdoor triggers via specific request parameters (
_wploginor_wpm) and validates against a hardcoded SHA-256 hash or site-specific keys to grant unauthorized access [7].
Theme and Plugin Vulnerabilities
- Sydney Theme (CVE-2025-8999): An authentication bypass vulnerability has been identified; users should update to the latest version to prevent unauthorized access [5].
- SMS Alert Plugin (CVE-2026-15671): A critical SQL injection (SQLi) vulnerability was discovered, necessitating immediate mitigation to prevent database compromise [9].
Action Items for Hosting Providers
- Core Updates: Enforce or facilitate the update to WordPress v.7.02 across all managed instances to mitigate WP2Shell [3, 10].
- Monitoring: Audit environments for the Sydney theme and SMS Alert plugin, ensuring all versions are current and patched [5, 9].
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.