Friends Reunited relaunches

Friends Reunited, the 12-year-old UK-based social network, was relaunched on Tuesday.

The site was bought in 2009 from broadcaster ITV by Brightsolid, part of Scottish newspaper publishing group DC Thompson, for £25 million. ITV had previously bought the company for £175 million in 2005, when Friends Reunited claimed some 15 million registered users. Currently, around 1.5 million users visit the site monthly.

Brightsolid is positioning the social network as a personal archive and nostalgia service, with users being able to add material from photo archives of the Press Association and the Francis Frith collection to their shareable timelines. The company says that it will eventually make six million photographs, two million events and two million places available to around 20 million registered users.

The site is free to use, getting revenue from advertisers. Brightsolid, which has bought online rights to a number of national archival services including the British Library newspaper collection, has previously concentrated on paid-for genealogy and associated historical research. It says it will add more archive material over time to Friends Reunited.