I used to pirate a lot more when I couldn't afford to fill my media desires. Nowadays I'm a bit more principalled, I'm not paying collector prices for old super Nintendo games for instance. That shit gets emulated and if I've already bought a game on console, especially if I bought a standard and "complete" edition, I'll likely piratd a PC copy for modding and the like.
Though sometimes a piece of art is created by a morally bankrupt company and while I typically just ignore the things they produce, sometimes I really want to try it, so I pirate it.
Your point is absolutely valid, but what's happening at Twitter really is only relevant to social media news. There's no tech changing or advancing, just a really bad marketing decision. I personally do not believe that this is tech news or relevant to it.
It's an iOS feature, I'm pretty sure. Works on just about any hyperlink I think, I just sell the things though. I don't actually use them.