The very public fight between Amazon and Hachette illustrates why it's never a good idea to become too reliant on one distribution channel. A bevy of startups are vying to establish a real alternative in the form of a subscription ebook service, with two of them, Oyster and Scribd, enjoying the most funding and press attention.
But in some important ways, it's the lesser known Entitle Books that leading the race. A tiny operation based in Wilmington, N.C., Entitle was the first to give its customers access to the full catalogs of two of the five biggest publishers,
