http://www.exposedseo.com/2008/07/06/negative-pr-is-still-pr/ Negative PR is not always bad when it comes to backlinks. I am talking about public relations rather than page rank by the way. Even though these guys made me feel like the most hated man in the world.
I completely agree. Man, I need to think of a controversial topic and then send it off to the people who think it's immoral. The traffic and backlinks must've been killer
Anything that gets people talking about you/your site has the potential for backlinks. As long as it does not trash your reputation, it may not be a bad thing. I recall another thread here at DP where the software developer had an exploit discovered. He quickly picked up quite a few backlinks. While the exploit is not good and was repaired, those backlinks still exist and help him rank. lol