Jason Nickerson — Hosting Industry InsiderTwo 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.
- Sep 28, 2026
Billion Dollar Agents and the Cloud Real Estate Problem
Instinct just closed a massive $1 billion Series C, proving that the market's appetite for AI agents is currently bottomless, even if the business model is still rendering.
Read article: Billion Dollar Agents and the Cloud Real Estate Problem→ - Sep 27, 2026
Metabolic testing is losing the Bane mask and gaining a UI
PNOĒ is moving metabolic testing out of the clinical lab and into the gym floor with a self-serve mask that does not require a Ph.D. to operate.
Read article: Metabolic testing is losing the Bane mask and gaining a UI→ - Sep 26, 2026
Neoclouds and the Billion-Dollar Data Center Land Grab
Nscale secures $3.36 billion to scale AI infrastructure, proving that in the modern hosting era, the only thing bigger than the chips are the checks.
Read article: Neoclouds and the Billion-Dollar Data Center Land Grab→
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 Briefing: WordPress Core RCE KEV, Elementor CSRF & Linux GNOME Patches
1. CRITICAL: WordPress Core RCE Added to CISA KEV
CISA has officially added the WordPress Core Remote Code Execution (RCE) vulnerability to the Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog [3]. This flaw allows unauthenticated attackers to execute arbitrary code on the host server. Mass exploitation is active, targeting the large install base of older WordPress versions [1][7].
- CVE / Severity: CVE-2026-87902 | CVSS 9.8 (Critical)
- Affected versions: WordPress Core 4.7.0 through 7.1.1
- Fixed in: WordPress 7.1.2
- Action now:
- Force-update all managed instances:
wp core update --version=7.1.2 --force. - Audit server logs for unusual PHP execution in
wp-includesorwp-content/uploads. - Ensure WAF rules are active for known RCE patterns targeting WP core.
- Force-update all managed instances:
2. Infrastructure & Linux: GNOME FS & Web Stack Vulnerabilities
Updates have been released for critical Linux desktop and filesystem components often found on administrative workstations or specialized server environments. These include a JavaScript injection flaw and a use-after-free bug in core image libraries [8].
- CVE / Severity: Not disclosed in sources (Multiple flaws)
- Affected versions: GNOME versions prior to 50.5; gvfs, Epiphany, and librsvg components.
- Fixed in: GNOME 50.5 (Released Sept 24, 2026)
- Action now:
- Update Linux workstations and impacted servers:
dnf updateorapt upgradeto pull GNOME 50.5 components. - Specifically ensure
librsvgandgvfsare updated to prevent exploitation via malicious image rendering.
- Update Linux workstations and impacted servers:
3. WordPress Plugin Exploits: Elementor & Contact Form 7 Addons
Two high-impact plugin vulnerabilities are seeing increased activity. A CSRF flaw in Elementor allows for unauthorized administrative account creation via a single click by an authenticated admin [5]. Additionally, a file upload flaw in a Contact Form 7 addon enables RCE [6].
- Elementor CSRF (CVE-2026-62062):
- Affected versions: Elementor < 4.3.2
- Fixed in: 4.3.2
- Action now: Update Elementor immediately:
wp plugin update elementor.
- Ultra Addons for Contact Form 7 (CVE-2026-82901):
- Affected versions: Not disclosed in sources (Arbitrary File Upload)
- Fixed in: Not disclosed in sources (See plugin repository for latest)
- Action now: Disable the plugin if a patch is not present; audit
wp-content/uploadsfor unexpected.phpfiles.
4. Cross-Platform Threats: SharePoint Active Exploitation
Infrastructure teams managing hybrid environments should note that Microsoft SharePoint CVE-2026-65660 is now under active exploitation in the wild, six weeks post-patch [2].
- CVE / Severity: CVE-2026-65660 | CVSS (Not disclosed in sources)
- Affected versions: Microsoft SharePoint (Specific versions not disclosed in sources)
- Fixed in: Microsoft August/September 2026 Patch Tuesday updates
- Action now: Verify SharePoint patching levels immediately; prioritize this over routine maintenance due to confirmed exploitation.
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.