Spotted in BeyondVC:

I have heard numerous stories over the last few months about smaller, innovative startups having a hard time bringing on qualified engineers as Google and Yahoo are offering 3 year packages of a $1mm or more in salary, restricted stock, and signing bonus.  I must admit, this is a pretty tough environment to compete against.  In fact, as you look at the landscape, everything that Google and Yahoo is doing is about stockpiling talent.  Let's not forget that all of those tiny acquisitions of small startups is about bringing on the best talent possible. 

If that's really how it is, then picking the same set of tools and methodologies as everyone else is not going to give you a leg up. You need to grab some kind of advantage.