It is important, because it shines light on the seriousness and meaningfulness of the issue. Of course I wasn't thinking about an armed Predator (I mentioned it only to highlight the high end of the scope of things that people call "drones"). But here are some questions I'd like the article to answer:

- Was it a helicopter or a fixed-wing aircraft?

- Was it something small or the kind of fixed-wing that companies use to do terrain imaging (think 3x4 meters, $10k+/piece)?

- Was it a cheap radio-controlled toy or something capable of flying BVR or autonomously?

- If fixed wing, was it a proppeler plane or a jet?

A lot depends on those answers. If that was just a random dude who bought a Phantom off eBay, then it's not really worth even writing about. On the other hand, it that was a model jet, it has very serious safety implications related to both speed and the noise its engines generate. Furthermore, if that was just an RC heli then again it's probably nothing, while if it was a long-flight-duration BVR/autonomous vehicle, it could be anything from a shady company doing something illegal to criminals scoping places for a strike.

Reading this article, I can't really be sure if that "mysterious drone" was any of the above, or if someone just strapped few LEDs to a pidgeon.

As for lumping everything under the name "drone" - for the last few years when you saw a news article with the word "drone" in it, it was usually followed by either a causalty count or remarks about police power abuse. People are scared of this term. Also, it feels sort of weird to call a cheap toy-quadcopter "a drone", much in the same way as calling a tank "a car".