Global editor Mark Jones leaves Reuters - for third time

Reuters global editor for networked journalism Mark Jones (photo) is leaving the organisation - for the third time.

Announcing the departure after Jones’s five months in the job, executive editor for editorial operations Reginald Chua said he had decided to pursue interests in social media and online publishing elsewhere, “and we’re going to miss him”.

Over the past 13 years Jones had pioneered most of the social and community initiatives within Reuters, Chua said. As editor of the Reuters Foundation’s AlertNet, he built a vibrant, award-winning community of NGOs around humanitarian news.

“Between 2006 and 2009 on reuters.com, he drove our blogging, live-blogging and micro-blogging in the form of Twitter. As Global Communities Editor, he showed you could get busy, competitive financial market professionals to collaborate in our forums. And more recently, he has helped us develop vital skills in social media news-gathering, particularly in TV.”

Jones leaves at the end of the month. He will hand over his communities responsibilities to Chris Kaufman. Yann Tessier will take on the development of Reuters social media news-gathering efforts.

Jones first joined Reuters from Euromoney in 1987 as a markets reporter. He left in 1990 and joined the BBC as a reporter/producer, then re-joined Reuters in 1994 as global news editor, Reuters Financial Television.

He left for the second time in 2000, joining again in 2002 as AlertNet editor. ■