Sharepoint 2010 - social features only work when page is checked out?

Hi,

I have an unusual problem with a site collection on a SP2010 platform, specially with the publishing feature turned on.

On publishing sites - the social features such as "I like it" and the "note board" web part don't work - unless the page is checked out. When the users click "I like it"...there is a "Failed tagging page" error, and when the user tries to post to a note board it simply sticks at "working"...But if the user first checks out the page - these work as expected.

This happens across the board  on every publishing site on the site collection - but only on publishing pages (Wiki pages seem to work fine), even the simplest publishing page causes this error.

Has anyone experienced this?

Thanks