> For all I love about it, it seems unlikely to ever progress beyond its current role as a pleasant book reader largely disconnected from all other sources of content.
that summed it up for me. That's all I want. I want it to be disconnected from all other sources of content. I don't want to be interrupted with a notification saying that x website uploaded a new article or whatever.
That a Kindle is boring is a feature, not a problem. I don't pick up a Kindle for the Kindle-ness, it's for the books on it. With the right book, some days that boring Kindle is the device that I just can't put down.
Frankly, I wish Amazon would stop with stuff like Goodreads integrations. Take that out and focus relentlessly on the reading experience - better display, better battery life, better ergonomics, and most of all - better typography.
Considering newspapers were black and white for hundreds of years, and for a long time printed color photos as black and white, this seems an odd conclusion.