Statutory damages aren't given to the citizens directly; they're put into the state's coffers in their entirety. This is slightly different than the other lawsuits- this is a FINE that is being assessed and if they're found guilty, they'll have to pay the same, or be barred from doing business in the state of Texas. Not quite the same thing as the tobacco settlements, etc.
If it were something other than this, I'd agree with you, but in this case, you need to know what laws are being applied and how they all work before speaking up. Not knowing, you make yourself look the part of the fool. Don't let your cynicism rule you, find out more before commenting.
That this is a STATE Attorney General, suing on behalf of the citizens of his (MY) state, the State Of Texas. Considering that any statutory penalties would go into the state coffers and NOT into the AG's pockets (He's a salaried employee of the State of Texas, not your lawfirm type attorney...) your claims of 33% of this going into his pockets would be dead wrong. Your rant, nice though it was, was like a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. (With apologies to Wm. Shakespeare...)
Per incidence typically means per instance of contamination of a given machine, given the law in question that they're applying to Sony from the state. Given that any other spyware incident, they'd be applying the per machine criteria (otherwise the law is effectively without teeth...), this means that Sony is really facing quite a bit of damages after all- and it's NOT 1.6 mil.
Ultimately, the people responsible are the ones at the top. That's right, the corporate management in Japan at Sony Headquarters are the ones ultimately responsible. They didn't do it, but they DID put the people in place that DID. If they don't sack each and every one of them AND hang them out to dry, they're tacitly complicit in the actvities of Sony BMG and as such, they should be held accountable, right along with the people at Sony BMG. It doesn't matter that SCEA didn't do any wrong- ultimately Sony's corporate management did wrong. THAT, my friend is how business actually works. I should know, I'm one of the ones that is at the top looking down on things.
I don't wish SCEA's people ill, but the company as a whole, did something wrong- if the company doesn't deal with it's errant division, then the company as a whole should be punished.
Distribution in and of itself isn't the problem, it's one of making copies without permission (i.e. Making a CD with unlicensed GPLed code (If you don't agree to the GPL or don't abide by the terms, you lose the reproduction and derivative works rights granted by the same...))- Sony is guilty of an act of infringement with an intent to profit by it.
Simply put, there should be criminal charges brought up against everyone in the decision chain for this mess- which includes any execs in Sony BMG or Sony corporate, First4Internet, etc. They would hang anybody else that would commit this sort of act out to dry- Sony and anyone else involved should be treated in the exact same way.
Again, they try the thoroughly rigged "study" trick. Mindcraft pasted them, you'd have thought they'd learned from that fiasco, but noooooo... Ah well, more ammo to be used against them in the coming year- just like Mindcraft...
Infringement can be a tort AND a criminal case, depending on the nature and scope of the infringement. Some of the P2P stuff could very probably be called a tort (Unlike what the *AA orgs and their ilk would have you believe...) and the bigtime ones would definitely be criminal- but they're also guilty of a tort at the same time.
...it's still a material mis-statement made to a Court. NOT a good thing to be doing, esp. if you're a Lawyer admitted to the Bar in that Court.
Judges don't take very kindly to that sort of thing, even accidentally done- I sure as Hell wouldn't want to be the Lawyer if the Judge finds out that they made this mistatement.
I think all the proponents of Java kind of missed the point here. Not everything has or even NEEDS the level of horsepower that Java requires- and just adding more muscle isn't always in the chips.
And even then, saying "Java" will run everywhere, is really a mis-concept. It'll run most everywhere where there is a least common denominator. I can tell you that while it makes it easier for Oddlabs to make Tribal Trouble for three platforms simultaneously, Java doesn't make it cross-platform- you can't take it and run it on say a Solaris box (though I suspect they could MAKE a Solaris iteration of the game easily enough...) or on an embedded machine using Java, say like the Ignite platform.
Java makes some things "easier" to make cross-platform, but again, it's like anything else- cross-platform is more of a philosophy than a feature set of a language or toolset. And it's definitely NOT the panacea that the proponents in this thread make it out to be- I should know, I do Java development amongst other things. If you can't make a C++ program at least 40% faster than your best Java code, you might want to re-work the C++ code. This is not to say that it's a bad idea or anything; it's just that people keep trying to jam it into problem sets that it's ill suited for.
So, before you go on, I am right about the, "it did nothing to help" comment about the discs- and they did themselves out of a market segment right out of the gate by doing it.
That would depend on what you define as "not a mistake". If you stick to a specific idea/design and it doesn't work anywhere near what you'd hoped, it's a mistake or mis-step, no matter how you cut it. That IS what happened with the Game Cube. Just because they're the oldest player remaining in the market doesn't make them infallible or all-knowing. They're third place right now. Some of that is due to Microsoft being in the playground- but some of it was the insistance of some of the decisions they made.
They chose to release a system with no DVD capabilities, ostensibly to prevent piracy.
Seems like they failed on that regard... This means that at the time that PS2's and X-Boxen were selling, they could be used as dual boxes, a DVD player and a console. For many, it was a decision already made- they didn't want to shell out nearly half again or more for a DVD player AND a console. Game Cube need not apply as they play those mini-discs only.
They chose to release games that largely felt like kiddie/family values type games. Nothing wrong with that, but Sony had no compunctions on that regard. The dazzling array of titles for the Playstation 2 versus GC isn't because Sony's cheaper on royalties, they're much more reasonable with the requirements/testing for their stamp of approval, or that the PS2 is technically superior. It's because they started out with a larger array of titles that appealed to the crowd that are buying consoles- and it's not all parents buying the things for kids these days. This translated into MUCH more consoles sold for the PS2 than the GC at the start- which then causes a network effect that is rather difficult to break once it gets fully under way.
Those are mis-steps, no matter how you slice it. In the business world, sticking with what works in the past will only get you so far. Nintendo tried to push it a little farther than they probably ought to and ended up dead last after it was all said and done.
I think you missed the point. Completely, in fact.
The point was that the impression was that Nintendo offered "family" type games and the studios picked the Playstation II because it didn't do that. Just because the games are appealing to you and the others aren't (By the way, I've got both of those titles (I've got about 1/4 of all available GC titles in the US...) and I play them on a periodic basis)- it doesn't change the impressions (Or the market- which, by the by, the Japanese market is as bloody or worse than the US ones. You MIGHT want to get off your anti-American horse there...) or what happened.
But it's not silence. It's more akin to what IBM did in their docs. Now, IBM might want to sue him, but it's not likely- at most, they'll just license the derivative works to him or license it under some license like the FDL/GPL/etc. like they've done their contributions to the Linux kernel.
The transcripts of the orals give them saying clearly "2.7" in the discussions of the filing.
That means that the Lawyer in question either didn't do his work going into the hearing, relying on the content of the filing- or he genuinely believes there's a 2.7 version. Either way, that doesn't reflect well upon SCO's Counsel.
They also demand that 3D Realms turn over the source code for Duke Nukem Forever.
Indeed. While they're at it, they probably ought to insist that IBM hand them a couple of Jackalopes or Snipes. I mean, why not, they're obviously going for broke here...
Considering that they said "2.7" in the oral presentations in the court, yes, this is silly beyond words, and I suspect that the Nazgul will respond accordingly...
I suspected that this sort of BS was WHY SCO filed everything under seal- it'd be shown for the lame tripe that they've been shown to be holding in their hand up to this point. I think they may well have been handed all the rope they need and then some; I think there's some PSJ's in SCO's relative near future and a raftload of agony for the Principals on SCO's side in this whole debacle.
Well, at least one can HOPE that this will end finally soon enough.
Someone hinted that it'd be damned cool if Linus went and sent out an email, announcing 2.7, with the content in a file or the email to the effect of: "This Release Intentionally Left Blank" and then release 2.8/2.9.
1) Microsoft, at it's heart, is a software company, buying it's way into the console market. The bulk of it's revenue is NOT from this segment and the whole business is more from Office and XP/2003 server sales than anything else.
2) Sony, at it's heart, is a consumer electronics company. It's existence is there to begin with.
Microsoft would have to redirect a substantive portion of it's proceeds to match what Sony's spending by default on the products in question. Microsoft is coming in against an entrenched leader in the CE space. Microsoft might be able to hold it's own against them, but they're going to have to change from within to be something more like Sony as a company, instead of what they are right now for what you're claiming to be the case to be a concern. If this were GE or IBM you're talking about, I'd believe you. This is Microsoft here- not everything they touch turns to gold.
Yes, and no. Portable gaming is about the only thing keeping them afloat right now. The console market's not 100% about kiddie gaming. Hasn't been for a while, but Nintendo thought (wrongly...) that they could still pull off a rollout of that nature in the home console market. Portable gaming is about to take the same route that home console gaming went- and it appears that Nintendo's learned something from the pasting they got this last round in the console market. The DS has a broader appeal than just kiddie type titles. They're going to have to do that to keep in the game- Sony's just entered the market and they've got a broad customer base in mind for the PSP and it can play movies as well.
It is a weakness to cater solely to the kiddie market segment- while it's done them well, it's about to not do so hot for them in the bigger picture. If they don't change with the times, they'll end up like Sega did.
I own one and while I don't think it is too kiddie, they DID lend that impression with the GC earlier on because there really wasn't a lot of adult/mature appealing titles out for it when it shipped, unlike the PS2 and X-Box.
What was available in the "M" category at the first release date?
Eternal Darkness, I think was mostly it (And a damned good game at that...). Most of the rest of the titles were kiddie style games and a couple of things like Madden Football, etc. There were follow on titles of the "cool" variety like Eternal Darkness, but the damage of the impression was done by how many kiddie type titles were available for the GC versus the more adult ones.
Nintendo missed the boat on this round of consoles; the titles they'd lined up at release colored the impressions of the console and made it a little less appealing to other studios to make titles for- the impression was that Nintendo was placing the market for the GC with the younger audiences. Basically, Nintendo was still marketing to and planning for the younger crowd where they used to make their money, when they should have been catering initially to a broader audience with the rollout of the GC. When the X-Box came out, they had an edge, but they lost it fairly quickly because MS could out-spend them and managed to score enough X-Box Only titles (such as Shenmue, etc...) that they lost that edge. Right now, I wouldn't count them out yet- they've still got at least one iteration of consoles to go before they're in trouble and I think they might have learned something from the oopses done with the GC's marketing and sales efforts (which they DID do...).
When you start looking at what Nintendo did with the GameCube, you start realizing that it wasn't that Microsoft kicked them out of the second place slot, it's Nintendo failed to execute sufficiently to keep the second place slot.
If they'd designed the GameCube a little differently, say with a DVD drive in it instead of their cutesy discs... If they'd not gunned for the kiddie games company role (which has always been a failing of Nintendo...)...
If either or both of them happened differently, X-Box would have most likely ended up third. Even then, Microsoft didn't really kick them, they out bought them. Like the grandparent poster indicated- they basically GAVE the X-Box away, spending more than either of the other two players, just to get that second place. Imagine what would have happened if Sony had seriously opted for that play- Sony's a MUCH bigger company with even deeper pockets.
"terrorists could potentially drive up, connect, and unleash an attack on infrastructure (power grid, etc.)."
Here's a reality item for you. The terrorists do not need to be in your neighborhood to do this. Hell, they don't even need to be in the country for that matter. Simply put, there's enough out there in the way of infrastructure on the Internet, why in the heck would they endanger themselves by even being in this country when they could attack from anywhere else in the world, using their own or someone else's subborned gear.
Simply put, that's not a concern.
"peidophiles could drive up, and transmit their data, then leave... with nobody knowing who they are, and it being pretty much impossible to track down."
Again, yeah, they could DO that, but why bother? Especially when they can do it clandestinely enough with their own resources or a subborned set of systems. If they've got the skills to compromise WEP, they typically have the resources to cover their tracks- and it's still a mis-use of the system and they could get caught easier by doing what you're talking to.
"lauching of a virus or bot attack."
Geez... You're not with it these days, are you? Hell, Sony even sets it up so anyone can clandestinely do this- all from the comforts of home without ever running the risk of getting caught. Besides, how many of the virii, trojans, and worms got started this way? I'll bet few to none is the answer to that one.
"No longer is traceroute a good solution to find out who is at the end of the line. Anyone can find any open wifi, connect, do harm... and leave. By the time the damage is realized, they can be hundreds of miles away.
Why would a criminal work from home? Use someone elses network."
Uh, this is new HOW? It never was a good solution to rely solely on traceroutes- how many subborned machines does the attacker have? Is the end machine that did the "attack" owned by the attacker or 0wn3d? It doesn't matter if the network and machines are wireless or not. Honestly. They don't even NEED to drive up to your unsecured wireless network to do things like you describe- and not get caught. So, why go to the trouble of driving about in the first place- you're actually more likely to get CAUGHT because you need to be lurking in a neighborhood for a while just to be able to even DO things in most cases. They won't unless their idiots. Honestly.
It's always been this way with the Internet. You didn't know this? Well, sorry to tell you this, but it's been this way for decades now- and wireless is just one more way, no easier or harder, to accomplish this sort of thing for the criminals. It's nothing new. Open AP's doesn't make things "easier". Security is something of a mindset in the first place and legislating it isn't going to fix it.
Slashdot Mirror
Statutory damages aren't given to the citizens directly; they're put into the state's coffers in their entirety. This is slightly different than the other lawsuits- this is a FINE that is being assessed and if they're found guilty, they'll have to pay the same, or be barred from doing business in the state of Texas. Not quite the same thing as the tobacco settlements, etc.
If it were something other than this, I'd agree with you, but in this case, you need to know what laws are being applied and how they all work before speaking up. Not knowing, you make yourself look the part of the fool. Don't let your cynicism rule you, find out more before commenting.
...that they haven't and are just biding their time? With the Sony Rootkit in place, it'd be difficult to
say with any certainty that they haven't.
Sony needs to be taken to the cleaners in damages for the irresponsibilty of doing this in the first place.
Microsoft needs to be taken to the cleaners in damages for the irresponsibility of allowing it to be doable in the first place.
That this is a STATE Attorney General, suing on behalf of the citizens of his (MY) state, the State Of Texas. Considering that any statutory penalties would go into the state coffers and NOT into the AG's pockets (He's a salaried employee of the State of Texas, not your lawfirm type attorney...) your claims of 33% of this going into his pockets would be dead wrong. Your rant, nice though it was, was like a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. (With apologies to Wm. Shakespeare...)
But then, this IS Slashdot, afterall...
Per incidence typically means per instance of contamination of a given machine, given the law in question that they're applying to Sony from the state. Given that any other spyware incident, they'd be applying the per machine criteria (otherwise the law is effectively without teeth...), this means that Sony is really facing quite a bit of damages after all- and it's NOT 1.6 mil.
Ultimately, the people responsible are the ones at the top. That's right, the corporate management in Japan at Sony Headquarters are the ones ultimately responsible. They didn't do it, but they DID put the people in place that DID. If they don't sack each and every one of them AND hang them out to dry, they're tacitly complicit in the actvities of Sony BMG and as such, they should be held accountable, right along with the people at Sony BMG. It doesn't matter that SCEA didn't do any wrong- ultimately Sony's corporate management did wrong. THAT, my friend is how business actually works. I should know, I'm one of the ones that is at the top looking down on things.
I don't wish SCEA's people ill, but the company as a whole, did something wrong- if the company doesn't deal with it's errant division, then the company as a whole should be punished.
Distribution in and of itself isn't the problem, it's one of making copies without permission (i.e. Making a CD with unlicensed GPLed code (If you don't agree to the GPL or don't abide by the terms, you lose the reproduction and derivative works rights granted by the same...))- Sony is guilty of an act of infringement with an intent to profit by it.
Simply put, there should be criminal charges brought up against everyone in the decision chain for this mess- which includes any execs in Sony BMG or Sony corporate, First4Internet, etc. They would hang anybody else that would commit this sort of act out to dry- Sony and anyone else involved should be treated in the exact same way.
Again, they try the thoroughly rigged "study" trick. Mindcraft pasted them, you'd have thought they'd learned from that fiasco, but noooooo... Ah well, more ammo to be used against them in the coming year- just like Mindcraft...
Infringement can be a tort AND a criminal case, depending on the nature and scope of the infringement. Some of the P2P stuff could very probably be called a tort (Unlike what the *AA orgs and their ilk would have you believe...) and the bigtime ones would definitely be criminal- but they're also guilty of a tort at the same time.
I mean, TSG's pretty much slapstick already- and we were discussing them...
:-)
What's a little more of it, right?
...it's still a material mis-statement made to a Court. NOT a good thing to be doing, esp. if you're a Lawyer admitted to the Bar in that Court.
Judges don't take very kindly to that sort of thing, even accidentally done- I sure as Hell wouldn't want to be the Lawyer if the Judge finds out that they made this mistatement.
I think all the proponents of Java kind of missed the point here. Not everything has or even NEEDS the level of horsepower that Java requires- and just adding more muscle isn't always in the chips.
And even then, saying "Java" will run everywhere, is really a mis-concept. It'll run most everywhere where there is a least common denominator. I can tell you that while it makes it easier for Oddlabs to make Tribal Trouble for three platforms simultaneously, Java doesn't make it cross-platform- you can't take it and run it on say a Solaris box (though I suspect they could MAKE a Solaris iteration of the game easily enough...) or on an embedded machine using Java, say like the Ignite platform.
Java makes some things "easier" to make cross-platform, but again, it's like anything else- cross-platform is more of a philosophy than a feature set of a language or toolset. And it's definitely NOT the panacea that the proponents in this thread make it out to be- I should know, I do Java development amongst other things. If you can't make a C++ program at least 40% faster than your best Java code, you might want to re-work the C++ code. This is not to say that it's a bad idea or anything; it's just that people keep trying to jam it into problem sets that it's ill suited for.
The link in question refers to a hoax, but piracy IS possible on the GC...
2 75>As this article indicates...
http://www.n-sider.com/articleview.php?articleid=
So, before you go on, I am right about the, "it did nothing to help" comment about the discs- and they did themselves out of a market segment right out of the gate by doing it.
That would depend on what you define as "not a mistake". If you stick to a specific idea/design and it doesn't work anywhere near what you'd hoped, it's a mistake or mis-step, no matter how you cut it. That IS what happened with the Game Cube. Just because they're the oldest player remaining in the market doesn't make them infallible or all-knowing. They're third place right now. Some of that is due to Microsoft being in the playground- but some of it was the insistance of some of the decisions they made.
They chose to release a system with no DVD capabilities, ostensibly to prevent piracy.
Seems like they failed on that regard... This means that at the time that PS2's and X-Boxen were selling, they could be used as dual boxes, a DVD player and a console. For many, it was a decision already made- they didn't want to shell out nearly half again or more for a DVD player AND a console. Game Cube need not apply as they play those mini-discs only.
They chose to release games that largely felt like kiddie/family values type games. Nothing wrong with that, but Sony had no compunctions on that regard. The dazzling array of titles for the Playstation 2 versus GC isn't because Sony's cheaper on royalties, they're much more reasonable with the requirements/testing for their stamp of approval, or that the PS2 is technically superior. It's because they started out with a larger array of titles that appealed to the crowd that are buying consoles- and it's not all parents buying the things for kids these days. This translated into MUCH more consoles sold for the PS2 than the GC at the start- which then causes a network effect that is rather difficult to break once it gets fully under way.
Those are mis-steps, no matter how you slice it. In the business world, sticking with what works in the past will only get you so far. Nintendo tried to push it a little farther than they probably ought to and ended up dead last after it was all said and done.
I think you missed the point. Completely, in fact.
The point was that the impression was that Nintendo offered "family" type games and the studios picked the Playstation II because it didn't do that. Just because the games are appealing to you and the others aren't (By the way, I've got both of those titles (I've got about 1/4 of all available GC titles in the US...) and I play them on a periodic basis)- it doesn't change the impressions (Or the market- which, by the by, the Japanese market is as bloody or worse than the US ones. You MIGHT want to get off your anti-American horse there...) or what happened.
But it's not silence. It's more akin to what IBM did in their docs. Now, IBM might want to sue him, but it's not likely- at most, they'll just license the derivative works to him or license it under some license like the FDL/GPL/etc. like they've done their contributions to the Linux kernel.
Not likely...
The transcripts of the orals give them saying clearly "2.7" in the discussions of the filing.
That means that the Lawyer in question either didn't do his work going into the hearing, relying on the content of the filing- or he genuinely believes there's a 2.7 version. Either way, that doesn't reflect well upon SCO's Counsel.
...an Indrema L600...
Indeed. While they're at it, they probably ought to insist that IBM hand them a couple of Jackalopes or Snipes. I mean, why not, they're obviously going for broke here...
Considering that they said "2.7" in the oral presentations in the court, yes, this is silly beyond words, and I suspect that the Nazgul will respond accordingly...
I suspected that this sort of BS was WHY SCO filed everything under seal- it'd be shown for the lame tripe that they've been shown to be holding in their hand up to this point. I think they may well have been handed all the rope they need and then some; I think there's some PSJ's in SCO's relative near future and a raftload of agony for the Principals on SCO's side in this whole debacle.
Well, at least one can HOPE that this will end finally soon enough.
Someone hinted that it'd be damned cool if Linus went and sent out an email, announcing 2.7, with the content in a file or the email to the effect of: "This Release Intentionally Left Blank" and then release 2.8/2.9.
Perhaps... But something you have to realize.
1) Microsoft, at it's heart, is a software company, buying it's way into the console market. The bulk of it's revenue is NOT from this segment and the whole business is more from Office and XP/2003 server sales than anything else.
2) Sony, at it's heart, is a consumer electronics company. It's existence is there to begin with.
Microsoft would have to redirect a substantive portion of it's proceeds to match what Sony's spending by default on the products in question. Microsoft is coming in against an entrenched leader in the CE space. Microsoft might be able to hold it's own against them, but they're going to have to change from within to be something more like Sony as a company, instead of what they are right now for what you're claiming to be the case to be a concern. If this were GE or IBM you're talking about, I'd believe you. This is Microsoft here- not everything they touch turns to gold.
Yes, and no. Portable gaming is about the only thing keeping them afloat right now. The console market's not 100% about kiddie gaming. Hasn't been for a while, but Nintendo thought (wrongly...) that they could still pull off a rollout of that nature in the home console market. Portable gaming is about to take the same route that home console gaming went- and it appears that Nintendo's learned something from the pasting they got this last round in the console market. The DS has a broader appeal than just kiddie type titles. They're going to have to do that to keep in the game- Sony's just entered the market and they've got a broad customer base in mind for the PSP and it can play movies as well.
It is a weakness to cater solely to the kiddie market segment- while it's done them well, it's about to not do so hot for them in the bigger picture. If they don't change with the times, they'll end up like Sega did.
I own one and while I don't think it is too kiddie, they DID lend that impression with the GC earlier on because there really wasn't a lot of adult/mature appealing titles out for it when it shipped, unlike the PS2 and X-Box.
What was available in the "M" category at the first release date?
Eternal Darkness, I think was mostly it (And a damned good game at that...). Most of the rest of the titles were kiddie style games and a couple of things like Madden Football, etc. There were follow on titles of the "cool" variety like Eternal Darkness, but the damage of the impression was done by how many kiddie type titles were available for the GC versus the more adult ones.
Nintendo missed the boat on this round of consoles; the titles they'd lined up at release colored the impressions of the console and made it a little less appealing to other studios to make titles for- the impression was that Nintendo was placing the market for the GC with the younger audiences. Basically, Nintendo was still marketing to and planning for the younger crowd where they used to make their money, when they should have been catering initially to a broader audience with the rollout of the GC. When the X-Box came out, they had an edge, but they lost it fairly quickly because MS could out-spend them and managed to score enough X-Box Only titles (such as Shenmue, etc...) that they lost that edge. Right now, I wouldn't count them out yet- they've still got at least one iteration of consoles to go before they're in trouble and I think they might have learned something from the oopses done with the GC's marketing and sales efforts (which they DID do...).
Define kicked...
When you start looking at what Nintendo did with the GameCube, you start realizing that it wasn't that Microsoft kicked them out of the second place slot, it's Nintendo failed to execute sufficiently to keep the second place slot.
If they'd designed the GameCube a little differently, say with a DVD drive in it instead of their cutesy discs...
If they'd not gunned for the kiddie games company role (which has always been a failing of Nintendo...)...
If either or both of them happened differently, X-Box would have most likely ended up third. Even then, Microsoft didn't
really kick them, they out bought them. Like the grandparent poster indicated- they basically GAVE the X-Box away, spending more than either of the other two players, just to get that second place. Imagine what would have happened if Sony had seriously opted for that play- Sony's a MUCH bigger company with even deeper pockets.
Here's a reality item for you. The terrorists do not need to be in your neighborhood to do this. Hell, they don't even need to be in the country for that matter. Simply put, there's enough out there in the way of infrastructure on the Internet, why in the heck would they endanger themselves by even being in this country when they could attack from anywhere else in the world, using their own or someone else's subborned gear.
Simply put, that's not a concern.
Again, yeah, they could DO that, but why bother? Especially when they can do it clandestinely enough with their own resources or a subborned set of systems. If they've got the skills to compromise WEP, they typically have the resources to cover their tracks- and it's still a mis-use of the system and they could get caught easier by doing what you're talking to.
Geez... You're not with it these days, are you? Hell, Sony even sets it up so anyone can clandestinely do this- all from the comforts of home without ever running the risk of getting caught. Besides, how many of the virii, trojans, and worms got started this way? I'll bet few to none is the answer to that one.
Uh, this is new HOW? It never was a good solution to rely solely on traceroutes- how many subborned machines does the attacker have? Is the end machine that did the "attack" owned by the attacker or 0wn3d? It doesn't matter if the network and machines are wireless or not. Honestly. They don't even NEED to drive up to your unsecured wireless network to do things like you describe- and not get caught. So, why go to the trouble of driving about in the first place- you're actually more likely to get CAUGHT because you need to be lurking in a neighborhood for a while just to be able to even DO things in most cases. They won't unless their idiots. Honestly.
It's always been this way with the Internet. You didn't know this? Well, sorry to tell you this, but it's been this way for decades now- and wireless is just one more way, no easier or harder, to accomplish this sort of thing for the criminals. It's nothing new. Open AP's doesn't make things "easier". Security is something of a mindset in the first place and legislating it isn't going to fix it.