We used to get drunk and debate the merits of the DSM as undergrads. Most of my friends who went on to get their PhDs still see it as a imperfect but necessary evil. As a researcher, you need a common language to discuss what you're researching. There is value to studying one particular group of symptoms vs another; different ones have different treatment guideless, medications, and potentially common biomarkers. But people don't always fit neatly in these boxes, as the article shows. It's entirely possible someday that we'll move past specific labels, but we don't have viable alternatives to the DSM right now.
