My theory is that since the settlement with Hachette, they don't see any way to make money in the space. E-books are ridiculously over-priced at the moment, and

My theory is that since the settlement with Hachette, they don't see any way to make money in the space. E-books are ridiculously over-priced at the moment, and Amazon is not allowed to discount, so it makes it difficult to build up the kinds of volume Amazon needs to really push the market. Their direct publishing arm has lost a lot of momentum as publishers have really stepped up their game in acquiring authors because of the influx of cash they get through this system. As a side note, the Oasis is for me the pinnacle so far of the Kindle family -- the physical buttons and the asymmetric design make in an excellent device. It suffers from some usability in the touch screen, and the shopping experience is super shitty, but the device itself when you're reading a book is excellent. Amazon with their devices tends to push their own content, rather than the Apple model of having "apps" -- if Amazon would just make their own content second-class (by providing an API and an "amazon reader app" for the device, and allowing other bookstores and reader apps) then it would really be quite phenomenal.