Guardian Thanks Pluck For UGC

Guardian Unlimited has become the latest news website to enlist the services of the Pluck media group to handle its user-generated content.

The agreement will see the US firm take control of managing users’ comments, article ratings and a whole host of other interactive tools.

Press Gazette reports that the Guardian will start using Pluck’s SiteLife Social Media Platform later this year as part of its website restructuring plans.

The package also creates facilities for user blogs, profiles, forums as well as photo and video-sharing sections.

“Obviously what the platform does is take a lot of the load off of our platform when it comes to commenting, rating and responding and managing communities more generally,” says Tom Turcan, general manager for digital at the Guardian.

He adds: “We’ve already got blogs and commenting and polls, but they are implemented on our legacy platform.

“Those will be transferred into the new environment and we’ll be using Pluck to enable us to do that, but we’ll also be using it to do a hell of a lot more.”

A significant number of major players in online news use the SiteLife Social Media Platform, including USA Today, and the Washington Post.