There in lies the opportunity, as soon as a startup gets acquired by one of the larger companies, might be a good idea to start such a company with the same/similar idea.

I'd think that even taking into account the phenomenon described in the article, it would be quite difficult for a new startup coming that late into the game to build enough traction to be a threat, barring any new and significant ideas.

This is also where IP comes in... can you reproduce someones product without violating their patents?

Most of the time, I reckon, yes.

Does feedburner even have patents?

Have you actually looked at patents? They are a cesspool of legalese and trolling for settlements.

Aren't you just conceeding the point? Patents are crafted like that precisely to prevent people from reproducing the work without violating them. Precise statements are easy to get around... fuzzy ideas and claims are much harder to circumnavigate.

Yes, but if this cesspool were a real barrier, nothing would ever get done! Ignore at first. You'll be too small to sue. When you start to get somewhere, you can attract those with the resources to defend you.

I wonder how much fault lies with the bureaucracy of large companies and how much lies with the acquired team suddenly transitioning from an environment where they are poor and must fight to survive to an environment where they are (at lest comparatively) rich and have no fear of their employer going bankrupt because if their development timeline slips?

I think the article was missing the '...And What To Do About It' part. Although, it may be a system that is perceived to be broken but in reality serves its masters well. The startup gets their payday and the acquiring entity may make some additional revenue and most likely get some sort of tax write-off.

I wrote down one idea here: http://www.spiteful.com/2008/08/12/so-youve-sold-your-first-...

Sometimes destroying the value of the company they acquire is the entire point of the exercise:

http://daringfireball.net/2005/04/adobe_translation

Yes this happens sometimes (Oracle/Innobase,...), but in the case of Adobe/Macromedia I think this very evidently not the case. I mean just look at Flash and what has become of it since Adobe bought it.