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As I know it, a black hole is indeed an object that has been so compressed by it's own mass, that it has actually become a singularity. A singularity is an object which has been compressed so much, that it has become impossible to compress it down any further. It's like cutting an apple in half, then quarters, then 1/16s and keep halving it until it cannot be halved. That is a singularity, and it has an infinite mass. For something to be compressed to such a level, such as the singularity, an infinite amount of time has to be passed. Only if you compress something an infinite amount of times, can you reach the state of a singularity. This is perhaps a black hole, and such objects usually arise from expired stars that have collapsed into their own gravities (supernovae). This is why Einstein imagined gravity to be like a trampoline (curvature of space and time). Imagine an object with a mass that is infinite (or close to it) has been placed on the trampoline (curvature of space and time). You'd expect objects to make their way towards the center of the curve. This is what causes or Milky Way galaxy to be spiral-shaped. We should be glad that gravity is a weaker force.

Here is something to consider. As we all know, one of the laws of thermodynamics, called the Universal Law of Conservation, stated that energy cannot be created, nor can it be destroyed. It can only be changed to another form. Just know that the black hole does not destroy matter in any way, it just uses it as a form of energy, and that energy remains within the universe.

As * Chris. said above, the singularity-centric (infinite time and mass) black holes have little to do with the article. This device actually absorbs photons and changes their form, therefore it is a form of black hole, but not to be confused with a singularity.