Well, about 6 years ago, a spelling reform was passed, and everybody, schools, newspapers, magazines, etc. were supposed to get on board by this month. Some major newspapers opted out early on and went back to the old spelling. (also more recently some states in Germany have gone back to the odl ways, too.) The only thing I know for sure is they got rid of the esszet (scharfes s) which is a ligature of a long s and a z (so, sz, ß). The rules for when to use -ss- (zB, ich wusste) or when to use -ß- (ich weiß) were tough on foreigners and Germans alike. I spoke with a couple of friends who teach in German high schools (one in a Gymnasium, and the other in a Gesamtschule), and they also mentioned a lot of the more obscure comma rules being dropped. I seem to also remember that German has some weird hyphenization rules that might have been affected.
Here's a couple of articles in English.
http://tinyurl.com/9yb9c
http://tinyurl.com/7ablp
And, if you read German here's a list of the new rules:
http://tinyurl.com/ay5h9
