looking for a clean way to set up news system

[robert_2004]

hey, i'm working with a friend on a vb3.7.x board
We're looking for a mod (or the best set up) that will allow me to post news in my forum (and have vBaCMPS pull it to my front page) - but i want a style like Engadget.com - with "filed under" (to place it into topics/subjects) and "tags".
that way our reg geusts can edit what news they are shown on an individual basis.
For instance, if i was doing news about F1 Grand Prix, i could have topics like: Ferrari, McLaren, Minardi, BMW, toyota, calendar events, race tracks, drivers, sponsors, fans, other, funny, team crew,

i want to then create a mod to have a dHTML window with all the topics in check boxes and let them choose to remove ones they don't want to read about.

i'm thinking whether i handle it all with the tags, and some conditionals,
or some other way?

ALSO - any cleaner way to handle images in posts (like maybe a directory of used images, and not allow linking to images, but rather link to a copy kept on server.

AND - a way to show a certain amount of text with image before the rest is kept after the jump, or just the link to the news site or company site. (i kow vbaCMPS has the character limit before displaying [read more] - but maybe i need a character counter on the 'new thread'/new news page so we know what is going to be seen on the page - OR even a BB_CODE that CMPS news module turns into a [read more] link, so we can start the link when we want.

feedback would be great.
-Robert