Blog

I'm enjoying the 6 part collection of minimalist designs posted by Vandelay Design. Some sites are more minimalist than others. I tend to use that term loosely at times as well. But the predominant theme seems to be type as interface, minimal use of graphics (aside from a logo and the body content), few if any graphic treatments of navigation, and little to no use of texture and graphic effects, and liberal use of white space.

http://vandelaydesign.com/blog/galleries/35-beautiful-minimal-websites/

Dashboard Insight has an extensive collection of screenshots of information dashboards that are worth a look.

http://dashboardinsight.com/dashboards/gallery/gallery-article.aspx

Joshua Porter writes about the use of microcopy to create confidence and alleviate concerns in customers about the actions they take on your site.

Ironically, the smallest bits of copy, microcopy, can have the biggest impact. ... Microcopy is small yet powerful copy. It’s fast, light, and deadly. It’s a short sentence, a phrase, a few words. A single word. It’s the small copy that has the biggest impact. Don’t judge it on its size…judge it on its effectiveness.

Porter provides a few detailed examples showing how microcopy helped users entering ecommerce funnels, in one case reducing errors by qualifying an address form, and in another case adding information to assure customers that they don't need a PayPal account to purchase with PayPal. He provides a few more before/after bits of copy for typical registration and ecommerce scenarios as well.

http://bokardo.com/archives/writing-microcopy/