I didn't understand why they would disable this feature which I love so much, but reading the bug explained that it was to prevent malicious apps from being able to change the default search in a way that is not easily reverted by users (keyword.URL can only be changed through about:config). Makes sense to me, and fortunately we have add-ons which can restore this functionality :)
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/keywordurl-ha...
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/keyword-searc...
I didn't understand why they would disable this feature which I love so much, but reading the bug explained that it was to prevent malicious apps from being able to change the default search in a way that is not easily reverted by users (keyword.URL can only be changed through about:config). Makes sense to me, and fortunately we have add-ons which can restore this functionality :)