PayPal to Launch Fancy New Homepages

Olivier Travers points out the upcoming changes to PayPal's homepages. The company plans to brand each country's page a bit differently. Travers writes, "I have to ask though, was the smiling guy with a double chin tested with actual people, or is this the result of a creative brief supposed to convey trust for "people just like you" but gone a little astray in its execution?" Seems PayPal is trading in its utilitarian design for that smiley face, stock photo, lame ass looking corporate website design. It's an inevitable step in a company's growth. But why try to "brand it up" for no other reason than to use some lame looking stock photography. I'm sure it came from some oft-cited research stating people like to see people in ads, on websites, etc. but why try to "brand it up" when the PayPal brand is analogous to the mundane act of taking a dollar out of your wallet and placing it in another's? It's obvious that fat guy on the US site is to make all us American fatties feel better when we send money to cover that order of the latest dietary supplement we had to try out because we just read Paris Hilton or Tom Cruise was doing it.