Are you being honest or deceptive when it comes to UI design and content?
A List Apart put out an amazing article yesterday about deception and honesty in UI design, which I definitely recommend reading if you get a chance. When writing and laying out content and interactive elements on your site, it's important to take into account the ways that readers look at web pages. Just a little bit of knowledge of the psychology of your readers can take you a long way towards building successful content. This same knowledge of human psychology, however, is often used in deceptive ways. Dark patterns are all over the web. They range from "mildly sheisty" to "walking the line between legal and illegal" and I'm sure you've come across a few of them. Burying the real costs of a subscription is one (since readers will often catch the intro to any section of text and only skim the rest).
Using checkboxes to trick you to subscribe is another manipulative practice. For example, a "Check here to not subscribe to our newsletter" form element buried deep inside a form. This is a real stickler - maybe a great way for high metrics on your campaign, but pretty awful for converted leads. Who wants a bunch of people subscribed to your email blasts who have no desire to receive them?
Being honest with your customer, both current and future, is the best long-term plan. A little sheistiness might help you meet some short-term goals, but in the long run, what you want with your customers is strong relationships, and honesty is the best way to achieve that.
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