This is close, but ultimately incorrect. The first paragraph is wrong because the purpose of textures is vastly different between retina and non retina. For non-retina they distract from the content which is hideous, pixelated, garbage that future generations will laugh at like an old Nintendo from the 80s. On retina, textures serve no purpose whatsoever except to exist as a throwback to the old days.
The second paragraph about eye strain is also wrong. The texture is the same day after day, year after year. You learn where every spect on that piece of cheap linen is, and then you hate it. The content is what changes. The texture is in fact a static burden and a 'bore' to stare at. Without it you are left with the much richer content and nothing to bore you.
You are perfectly entitled to understand incorrectly and share your misbeliefs, but I do hope no one else is misled by your comments. Which, by the way, you did a poor job of explaining.
You cannot explain why texture usage existed, it's purpose, by giving examples of why you think it is better that they're now removed. That doesn't make any sense. By your logic, they should never have been there in the first place. But they were, as a result of the evolution of user interface design. Before displays could handle much detail, everything was flat. Technical constraint. As displays improved, interface designers saw "better" usage with proper use (not to be confused with over-use) of textures. That's why textures gained widespread adoption. UI has improved over the years, and textures were part of that. They are disappearing now because trendy styles have been allowed to usurp actual usability.
Furthermore, to say that the purpose of textures on low-res vs. high-res is "vastly different," only to conclude by stating that they existed on high-res as a throwback, is not vastly different at all. That's pretty much saying they are there for the exact same reason. They were a best practice adopted long ago that continued to be valid and so remained.
Your argument that the linen texture is eventually learned and can too become a bore is not incorrect. It also doesn't prove your point in the least. All you've done is illustrate that while a flat container is instantly taxing, a textured container may eventually become taxing too. I'll concede that, but the clear winner, between those two options at least, is still the approach which postpones eye-strain the longest. Textures. It's also easier to "forget" and thus become "re-engaged" by the texture; the flat color is always instantly tedious to absorb.
Now, Apple at least understands this as evidenced by their attempt to incorporate your background image into much of the UI (as a blurred bit of coloring). They also allow content (which changes) to scroll up under top controls, making them more interesting than truly plain white. These are great improvements because they're now dynamically texturing some containers. But that's just it, textures are still king, and Apple improved on that by eliminating their very flaw that you pointed out: being static.
Where Apple failed on the issue of textures is removing them from places that don't benefit from their new dynamic behind-the-container color-blending stuff. Those UI controls are now entirely lifeless.
