Yep. This is another semi-fawning, apologistic article full of made-up assertions.
It ignores the fact that there has been a welcome step back from the derelict wasteland of "flat design" that users have endured for far too long. Flat design is often cited as a reaction to absurd levels of skeuomorphism, which Apple certainly WAS a leader in. Remember the "felt" surfaces of Game Center, the "paint" upon which was inexplicably a control? And the "leather" binding of Notes?
Then there's this: "In AR, visual affordances work differently. A button that casts realistic shadows and responds to virtual lighting feels more "real" when floating in your living room than a flat, colored rectangle."
That makes it a SHITTY control, which will get lost in the visual noise of the real environment. This UI sucks for the same reason that sports-stats graphics that are tracked onto real surfaces in TV coverage suck: They don't stand out. It's that simple.
So after years of "flat" design where nothing was demarcated as a control and users were apparently supposed to click on every pixel and every character on the screen in a hunt for hidden goodies, this article celebrates Apple's plan to create the same problem in AR using OVERLY-decorated controls.
Not to mention the stupidity of crippling computer, tablet, and phone UI for the sake of a "VR" UI. This isn't just dumb from a practical standpoint, but from a technical one as well. There's no reason that the control library can't be rendered differently on different devices. So, if this (admittedly poorly-substantiated opinion piece) is right about the motivation behind Apple's exhumation of the "transparent" UI fad that died 20 years ago, we can only lament the end of desktop usability... which Windows flushed vigorously with Microsoft's brain-dead attempt to dumb its UI down for touchscreens years ago.