Mark Briggs, co-founder of Serra Media, a Seattle-based technology firm building interactive publishing platforms, has published a new book, 'Journalism Next'. His Journalism 2.0 blog is currently running posts by guest writers, while Briggs writes over at LostRemote.com on the future for local media. Journalism.co.uk sent over few questions, asking just what is 'Journalism Next'?  And what comes after that?

So, tell us about the new book: what does it cover and how is it different from the first ['Journalism 2.0']?
[MB] The scope of Journalism Next is both broader and deeper. It covers a lot of new ground like microblogging and community management, things that were absent in Journalism 2.0, plus has updated information on the fundamentals of online journalism like blogging, audio, video and collaboration. It's about three times as long as the first book, too.

The first book was written for working journalists, not journalism students. At the time, I was running the website for The News Tribune in Tacoma, Wash., and trying to convince about 120 newspaper journalists to recognise and embrace the opportunities that digital technology presented.

I had started a monthly training session at the paper in 2006 and the book was an extension of that. Jan Schaffer at J-Lab is the person who suggested the first book and said she'd get it funded - which she did. So I owe her a debt of thanks for launching this new career as an author.

The format of Journalism Next is tailored for use in a classroom, but it's not just a textbook. We're calling it a guidebook and hope it will be useful as part of a journalism or media course or by an individual looking to master the digital skills necessary to publish and compete in today's information ecosystem.

Oh, and that first book is really old now. So it badly needed an update just to get current with technology.

Will any of it be available online?
Possibly. CQPress is the publisher and is talking about translations, a la carte options to allow people to download only certain sections of the book, and a Kindle version. But there are no plans to publish the entire work online like Journalism 2.0, which was made available as a free PDF download thanks to funding from the Knight Foundation.

I noticed you're changing aspects of your blog: why are you bringing more people on board?
After launching Serra Media a year ago, my professional focus shifted to local media. When Cory Bergman invited me to write for Lost Remote it made perfect sense.

But I didn't want to shut down my Journalism 2.0 blog because there is still an audience there and I think it's a valuable information service.

So I decided to see if there were other people with insight and analysis to share on the subject of journalism and technology and about a half dozen people have stepped up and volunteered.

In fact, the first two weeks with the guest writers brought a larger audience than I was drawing because I had not been able to maintain much frequency with everything else I had going on.

So I think it's a real win-win-win: some new voices get a chance to talk to a larger audience than they may have had on their own blogs, the audience gets to keep reading about new and exciting projects in online journalism, and I get to focus on local media while blogging for Lost Remote.

What will you be doing for Lost Remote?
I'm writing 4-5 posts per week on the areas of local media that I'm most closely involved with, namely hyperlocal strategy, independent news startups, local mobile and mapping projects, and the evolution of newspapers in the digital age.

There's so much going on in this space it's impossible to keep up with all of it, but as the CEO of local media technology company, it's my job as well as my passion.

What's your 'journalism next' message for 2010?
Keep moving forward. And stop looking back. I see so many examples of how journalism has improved, thanks to technology and collaboration.

There will be dozens of exciting independent news startups launched in 2010, but not a single one of them will be launched by someone still wishing to return to the 'way things were'.

You're now looking at entrepreneurship: can you tell us more?
I recently signed a new deal to write a book about going from journalist to entrepreneur. There are so many interesting organisations, companies and experiments popping up all over the place and I know there will be lessons to be learned and best practices to document.

I'm hoping to produce something that will highlight the most successful entrepreneurial journalism examples and teach readers how to become entrepreneurial themselves. I'm going to be doing extensive interviewing for the book but also drawing on my personal experiences and what I've learned in my own journey from journalist to entrepreneur.