I would disagree with your interpretation. You are assuming we think people on the short jumped on for a quick profit, I think that someone dumped enough shares to eat up the bid to a substantially lower level hoping that the pshycological effect of the article and price drop would trigger real stop losses much lower. The shorts had their positions well before that.
I suggest you watch this youtube video
where Cramer describes every tactic including selling at great losses to affect the perception and market price of stocks. He also details how the media is used in this game...as someone said the SEC is spineless to the RICH.