For many, it’s because the weight, form factor and screen are optimized for reading, especially outdoors, and the battery life is outstanding. I’m a fan of using my cell phone for reading, but it requires a lot more charging and isn’t good for reading in sunlight.
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Calibre’s GUI and UX isn’t just a lack of beauty — it’s downright awful, especially for a piece of software that ostensibly serves a wide demographic of users, including consumers. I’ve used a lot of software over the past third of a century — I don’t say this lightly. As you have, you are certainly welcome to disagree and have a different point of view. Unlike many these days, I have a decent tolerance for diversity of opinions.
Calibre is not my favorite, but better than my least favorite UI: Veoci.
The Calibre UI is fine for my everyday use. But I suspect that’s probably because I don’t use any advanced features, such as epub editing and creation.
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The display is much better for reading, the battery lasts a month. No notifications.
Have you ever tried one?
Edit: as @Skeptic already pointed out above
If you hate that, don’t try SAP 
Are you on Windows, Mac or Linux?
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I had one of the first Kindles, but I abandoned it for my cellphone. I have enough junk to keep track of. I don’t need an extra e-reader, though I admit, reading the cellphone in sunlight is bad.
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Me, too. However, for me, the devil is in the details when it comes to ereaders. The old Kindle I had with a keyboard was bulky, heavy and had poor contrast, a dark screen and lacked any kind of built in light. So I got rid of it. The new Kindle Paperwhite is tiny, light, has a bright screen with excellent contrast and has a good built in light for indoor reading.
I mostly listen to audio books, otherwise I’d definitely buy a Kindle for reading.
Because
- my phone’s screen is too small for longer books - I read short stories on it, but from time and time again I find it difficult to read long stuff.
- screen being on for so long at a brightness comfortable for rading = battery drain.
Personally I’d still rather get a tablet than an ebook reader though, so I can use it for reading manga and comics, and browsing/videos/etc. as well, unfortunately most tablets with specs that make them comfortable to use also have way too many functions I don’t need. So for my next excuse to splurge I’ll probably get an ebook reader.
I use iOS for mobile, I have a Windows 10-based PC I built, and a MacBook Pro. I also worked for a media IT systems integrator for 15 years and sold boatloads of Linux servers, not to mention Macs and Windows boxes. I’m pretty agnostic, and have never understood “platform wars.” What works for the task at hand and satisfies the users is the right choice, IMHO. 
Then you will agree that Calibre‘s developer made the right choice when writing cross-platform GUI code in QT, which is typically less than beautiful.
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Does anybody know of a e reader that can handle JP2 images with ease?
I’m happy with my kindle paperwhite for reading novels and the like, but I’d like to be able to download anything from archive.org, and be able to flip through it rapidly.
I’ve tried reading pdfs on my kindle-- but my eyes don’t appreciate the 6 inch screen-- regardless of dpi.
No, I wouldn’t actually, because in general my experience has been that cross-platform GUI code leads to really bad GUIs and UX.
You got a horse in this race? You seem so very invested in defending Calibre’s GUI and UX.
easier to read in bright sunlight.
No, it‘s just that I don’t think that Calibre is particularly ugly, or particularly hard to use, given that it is free software.
I also think that hiding complexity from people ultimately does them a disservice. Among other things because it makes people judge the design, and no longer appreciate the actual value a software would bring to them.
Everyone‘s free to submit a patch with a new GUI for Calibre, I would estimate it can be done in a year, plus another 3 months of integration hell. 
Edit: removed dont‘t
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