As promised by Skout Founder, Christian Wiklund - the homepage of Skout.com has been redesigned.  I feel that some great improvements were made, and at the same time some elements took a turn for the worst.

Here are some notes on the design.  I'll just break it down quickly from top down.

1.  The heart + the target icon.  Completely out of place and doesn't match the forward thinking idea of the site.  The illustration is more of hand done classic look.  It's also a bit misplaced, throwing of the balance of the homepage.  It also pushes the logo to the right quite a bit, creating another distraction and imbalance. 

2.  The text menu isn't aligned with anything, so it's a bit float and out of place.  

3.  The Login, Signup and Search buttons are overpowering in essence and underwhelming in execution.  

4.  I like the use of the slide show to point out what the site does.  It's a great add.

5.  The buttons are so big and bright, the search section of the site underneath sign up looks like an after thought.

6.  A little more work on the boxes that carry the phones and member could go a long way.  

7.  Use of a more updated phone would freshen' things up a bit.

8.  I would love a shot at this home page!! 

With these points said, I really appreciate the fact that they are trying to move forward and it seems like great design matters to Chris and his wonderful team.