Wouldnt stories reporting this also fall into the same definition? After all this is also "distributing knowledge on how to obtain illegal content online" since some people might not know what is Popcorn Time at all.
I know this is to make some people targets to make people afraid, but still.. Very weak definition.
You're not wrong, using simpler 2d tech would have made the process a lot easier, but this way it was a good intro and learning experience for making something bigger in 3d which will eventually require a lot of the same optimisations (and a lot more).
The only basic part missing in his article would be along the lines of combining textures into an atlas and dynamically modifying UV's so that for example the UFO's could have had different shapes and colours.
One good aspect of using a human as rubber duck is that you help share knowledge - plus the human could actually have some ideas based on your own problems too.