User Interfaces: Examples of Good UI
Wikipedia
From a UI standpoint, Wikipedia does a good job at establishing itself as a trustworthy site. Some of the criteria in which it does well include:
- Absence of Commercial Content: Wikipedia does not have banner advertisements, sponsored links, or other content that suggests that commercial interests may have influenced articles.
- Consistency: Wikipedia’s articles cover a massive range of topics, but they contain many common organizational elements. The fonts and sizes for the headings and paragraphs in each article are the same. Articles that fall within certain prominent categories (such as U.S. presidents, airports, companies, and countries) have similar-looking information boxes floating in the top right corner or at the bottom.
- Cleanliness and Simplicity: Wikipedia’s layout tries to ensure that users are not overwhelmed with information. Most of the HTML and the images are static. The navigation bar on the far left features a limited number of links that does not fill the entire column. Many boxes in an article itself can be toggled between visible and invisible, and extremely long boxes can be collapsed by default. An article’s discussion page, which can be extremely long and complicated, is kept separate from the actual article.
Whether or not Wikipedia's content is trustworthy is discussed here.