This piece is definitely good publicity, rather than bad. It takes the ideas seriously despite deliberately emphasizing the extent to which the author is confused by them, and writes in a tone appropriate for a mass audience.
You know how television shows will have the character who starts as "the new guy" they need to explain everything to, to serve as an audience insert? This author made himself the new guy.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/aug/30/saviours-universe-four-unlikely-men-save-world
The article is titled "The scientific A-Team saving the world from killer viruses, rogue AI and the paperclip apocalypse", and features interviews with Martin Rees, Huw Price, Jaan Tallinn and Partha Dasgupta. The author takes a rather positive tone about CSER and MIRI's endeavours, and mentions x-risks other than AI (bioengineered pandemic, global warming with human interference, distributed manufacturing).
I find it interesting that the inferential distance for the layman to the concept of paperclipping AI is much reduced by talking about paperclipping America, rather than the entire universe: though the author admits still struggling with the concept. Unusually for an journalist who starts off unfamiliar with these concepts, he writes in a tone that suggests that he takes the ideas seriously, without the sort of "this is very far-fetched and thus I will not lower myself to seriously considering it" countersignalling usually seen with x-risk coverage. There is currently the usual degree of incredulity in the comments section though.
For those unfamiliar with The Guardian, it is a British left-leaning newspaper with a heavy focus on social justice and left-wing political issues.