Change is in the air at Times Online where the site’s editor-in-chief Anne Spackman steps down to become comment editor of The Times. Tom Whitwell, currently communities editor, will become assistant editor, online, putting him level with the paper’s other assistant editors in hierarchy terms. The move signals a more integrated approach to The Times‘s overall structure with Whitwell responsible not just for a website, but for the digital activities of The Times as a media business.

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Spackman has had a busy two years in charge of Times Online: overseeing the growth of online journalism in the Times newsroom, launching the Times archive and, since its February 2007 relaunch, increasing traffic from 9 million unique monthly users to almost 20 million, according to September’s ABCe figures. The Times was for years well behind The Guardian, Daily Mail and Telegraph in terms of its headline traffic figures but now finds itself third in the UK.

—Hector Arthur is appointed head of digital development, online, for both The Times and Sunday Times, having previously been responsible for content development for Times Online.