Good Design:
American Museum Congo Expedition, 1090-1915 is both beautifully and usefully designed and keeps its content in mind at all times. It follows William’s and Tollett’s four principles of web design to near perfection. The site has an entry page that establishes its contents graphically. The main page is a site map which is useful without being overwhelming. The proximity of elements on this page allows users to distinguish between sections of the site with ease. The colors contrast well and are pleasing to look at. Repeated elements, such as the header bar and the navigation buttons, allow users to know where they are in the site at all times. The Gallery section uses thumbnails effectively. None of the pages require scrolling.
Bad Design:
WebMuseum has been around on the web almost since its foundation. Thus, I criticize it keeping in mind that its design flaws (like the Valley of the Shadow site) may be due to a gradual adding of material and redefinition of audience and purpose over time. That said … First, there is no site map. From the main page, it’s unclear how to go about navigating the site or even what is included in the site. The main page requires you to scroll down, further confusing users about where to begin. This confusion is augmented by the inconsistent alignment. The graphics are clip-art cheesy and have little to do with the content (unless, of course, Paul Cezanne was actually a dinosaur.) The background is solid white and the links are linkblue. Both are uncomfortable to look at for any length of time.
A Final Note:
Incidentally, both of these sites are included and reviewed in World History Matters. The American Museum site is certainly not the strongest WHM site in terms of richness of content, and the WebMuseum site is included in the project because the importance of its content outweighs its design flaws. This leads me to believe that design is not (yet?!) a crucial determinant for the overall worth of sites in the history web.