MarkMaunder dot com

MySQL GIS Extensions Quick Start

A friend is busy putting together a kick ass startup with a strong geographic component. He’s using Google Maps API version 3 which is a vast improvement (and total rewrite) from previous versions. But he needs to store and query his geographic data in a fast efficient way. There are many options out there, but […]

October 10, 2009 | mysql | 7 comments

NASA's little security oops

Last night I logged on to NASA’s Mauna Kea observatory live video feed to watch LCROSS slam into the moon. After LCROSS was finished pancaking into the moon and not producing the expected 6 mile plume, I noticed an IP address flash on the top right of the video display. So I hit it with […]

October 10, 2009 | NASA | No comments

Will Twitter's lax data ownership policy result in jail time?

Update: My real-time traffic feed says it all. 🙂 Thanks for the mention and link-love M.G. and Techcrunch. Two people died and 19 passed out at an Arizona sweat lodge last night. The author who hosted the event is James Arthur Ray and is an avid Twitterer. He deleted his 10 most recent tweets after […]

October 9, 2009 | Startups | 1 comment

The real LCROSS mission

October 9, 2009 | Startups | No comments

Remove GoBoingo to fix MacBook WiFi pauses, stutters, hiccups, latency, delays

I recently upgraded our router to the Linksys WRT320N router. I set the router to only transmit on 5GHz and the performance has been awesome because all our neighbors are still on 2.4 GHz, our 2.4 GHz cordless phones don’t interfere with our WiFi anymore and because 5GHz is better at getting around corners and […]

October 7, 2009 | Apple | No comments

Home remedy to de-skunk your dog, FAST!

Our 4 year old aussie cattle dog Joey just got skunked. My sister in law feeds left-over chicken to the local skunks and a big one arrived. We accidentally left Joey outside. Next thing the neighbor knocks on the door saying “Your dog is outside and he’s been skunked!” I’ve never smelled skunk before. It’s […]

October 3, 2009 | Aussie Cattle Dogs | No comments

Advice to a new Seattle entrepreneur

Google Groups archive of the STS mailing list isn’t working reliably, so I’m archiving a few emails I’ve sent to the STS list here. One day when I have too much time I’ll create a reliable threaded archive of the whole list. I sent this as a reply to a “getting started” advice request from […]

June 7, 2009 | Startups | 1 comment

The Two Universes

I posted this today to the Seattle tech startup mailing list. A few folks liked it, so I’m reposting it here. It’s in response to a NY Times article talking about VC’s not caring about a business plan. In my experience the most interesting things to a prospective valley based technology investor in descending order […]

May 15, 2009 | Startups | No comments

Great elder care resource launched today

Congrats to Chris Rodde and Jay Goldstein, two fellow Seattle entrepreneurs and friends for launching http://seniorhomes.com/ today. If you’re looking for a great resource forassisted living, memory care,  nursing homes and independent living homes for an elderly relative or friend, be sure to visit the site.

May 6, 2009 | Startups | No comments

Smashed iPhone

Update: According to my live traffic feed, busted iphones are hip. My bro posted this to reddit. Update2: @chrisrodde Just reminded me that this will be my third iPhone – I drowned the last one on a fishing trip with him. Update3: Just visited AT&T. The conversation went like this: AT&T guy: Um yeah, so […]

April 11, 2009 | Apple | 3 comments

My name is Mark Maunder. I've been blogging since around 2003 when I started on Movable Type and ended up on WordPress which is what I use to publish today. With my wife Kerry, I'm the co-founder of Wordfence which protects over 5 million WordPress sites from hackers and is run by a talented team of 36 people. I'm an instrument rated pilot and I fly a Cessna 206 along with a 1964 Cessna 172 in the Pacific Northwest and Colorado. I'm originally from Cape Town, South Africa but live in the US these days. I code in a bunch of languages and am quite excited about our emerging AI overlords and how they're going to be putting us to work for them.