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Google

Submission + - Google Search Screws Over SomethingAwful.com

An anonymous reader writes: You may have heard of the humour website SomethingAwful.com. Apparently, for all of their long history they've been having a problem where their website is listed far down Google's results (often last) for searches related to the site (such as the names of features and articles on the site). For example, when I google for "Photoshop Phriday", the site isn't in the first ten pages of results, despite the fact that Google has indexed the relevent page. In fact, the first result is a noproxy.us proxied version of the relevant page, and the rest of the results are blog and forum entries referring to Something Awful. (Results are apparently better on many non-English versions of Google, however.)

It's far from clear what's causing this; the site's PageRank is apparently fine. Attempts to contact Google have fallen on deaf ears and dumb autoresponders. The site was even recently redesigned in the hope of fixing the problem, with no luck so far. Is the world's most popular search engine really this broken, and how much money are people bringing in from knowing the black magic to work around it?
Security

Chinese Hack Attacks on DoD Networks Coordinated 295

An anonymous reader writes " The Naval Network Warfare Command says that Chinese hackers are relentlessly targeting Defense Department networks with cyber attacks. The 'volume, proficiency and sophistication' of the attacks supports the theory that the attacks are government supported. The motives of the attacks emanating from China include technology theft, intelligence gathering, exfiltration, research on DOD operations and the creation of dormant presences in DOD network for future action. Onlookers warn that current US defenses against these attacks are 'dysfunctional', and that more aggressive measures should be taken to ensure government network safety."
Education

Submission + - Teaching the 21st Century Skills Set?

Grishknash writes: "I'm a teacher at a well known private, international high school. We recently had David Warlick present at our school about 21st century literacy. http://davidwarlick.com/wiki/pmwiki.php?n=Main.Red efiningLiteracyForThe21stCentury I'm also a member of the recommendation committee at the school for science curriculum on content and skills. Being a techie type guy I naturally desire technological integration and literacy in my classroom, but I keep asking myself — when, how much, what types. So I thought to ask you, the slashdotters. What do you want your children to learn in science classes and how? To what degree content vs inquiry? What are the 21st century skills your [and my] children need for 21st century success? Are they the same skills my older colleagues [problem solving, critical analysis, creativity] say they are, or have they changed in some way? Like this group suggests? http://www.21stcenturyskills.org/"
Games

The History of Electronic Arts 65

Gamasutra is running an extensive article today on the long history of Electronic Arts. Starting all the way back with the days of Trip Hawkins, they move through the days of Madden, Nintendo, small studio purchases and, of course, the Sims. There's also an a whole series of images associated with the article, letting you look back and chuckle about the cover art of games from the past. The article concludes: "Art and commerce have always been uneasy bedfellows, and nowhere is that tension more evident than in the world of video games. Perhaps after looking at the history of Electronic Arts we may have some insight into that hot point of ignition where business and inspiration combine to create cutting edge games. As Trip Hawkins explained, 'Entrepreneurship is a creative art form. Like other creative people, we do it because we have to do it. We have no choice but to express ourselves in this way. But of course like all artists we are optimists, so we believe good things will come ... It is not about making money, it is about making a difference.'"

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