These days white color as a website background in much in use, more and more are experimenting with these theme. A white background would actually give enough scope for highlighting the web design elements that will be easy for the audience to know what they are looking for.
Its true.. Actually it helps in eye catching graphics that should be cool in looking. It helps in reflecting fonts in a good manner. Basically, if your site is mean to target for content than light colors are very useful.
I actually have a website with a darker background and get a lot of rave and hype about how good it looks. I think the color of your background doesn't determine much...it's really more the style and the whole throw together of the website.
I think it depend on site. White color match with corporate and business related site but if you have a site related to art, gaming so i think it doesn't match with this category sites.