Take a look at some of these popular Western portals. They are no less busy than the Chinese portals discussed in this article.

http://www.yahoo.com/

http://www.aol.com/

http://www.msn.com/

Google and Baidu both share a minimalist aesthetic because they aren't portals! They are just search engines.

Also consider America's most popular local classifieds site, http://craigslist.org/.