I've started development for News 2.5.
Started out with an update of the databasetable name (stories -> news), permissions scheme (Stories::Story -> News::), but need to test the upgrading stuff very carefully of course.
It also means updating some tables that are using the table name (categories, etc).
The layout of the "new article" template will be updated and draft versions will be introduced (like in Wordpress for instance). When you edit the title a first draft version is saved and the permalink created.
With the new Draft versions the likelyhood of losing an article is gone and you can start an article and finish it later on. Of course of number of other changes are on the list as well as they are in the tickets for 2.5
Multihook test: Smashing Magazine 50 beautiful and user friendly navigation menus [3]