My gen1 kindle backlight is so bright at the lowest level that I angle it away from me to read at night.

Just typing this out makes me realize I should get a different ereader than wait for it to die since it’s clearly never going to die. It’s been like 15 years

brightness should go the other way too.

for example I read kindle books on my phone in dark mode (white text on a black background). Having the brightness all the way up isn't fully bright white text, it is more like brightish grey.

To get bright text to read in bright environments, I set the kindle app to black text on white background, then use accessibility to invert colors. I get noticeably brighter text on a black background.