Now is as good a time as any to link to this interesting essay by PG: http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html
Wired writing about new tech products isn't creepy PR infringing on journalism, it's why people read it in the first place.
Crystal gives companies a new and more powerful tool for spreading their messages. Of course the first use is always innocent, but if this tech caught on (I can imagine in some form it will) then there is a lot of potential here for PR firms to interject their messages.
EDIT: I should add, I don't see Crystal as bad. I see it as inevitable. People have been blindly sharing private data on the web for a decade because no one used it? People will start using it.
Thereby freeing us from the drudgery of writing emails to each other. We'll have more free time!
</sarcasm>
well, another, say Quartz, app would read the message and decide to write back through for example the same Crystal. Complete automating of social life of automatons. While they are at it, we can socialize on our own...
Considering the number of bots on Facebook, and the number of humans who communicate with strangers in txspk, it's possible this has already happened.
I can see an inverse business opportunity - a tool to certify that your communication is 100% brain-made and authentically genuine.
Maybe artisanalemail.com?
To be fair, I think it's more aimed at more casual acquaintances whom you haven't gotten to know as well yet.
> EDIT: I should add, I don't see Crystal as bad. I see it as inevitable. People have been blindly sharing private data on the web for a decade because no one used it? People will start using it.
That's nothing - I've been intentionally, publicly, sharing how to effectively communicate with me for a decade - and information about how I communicate.
I can see the ick factor in giving e.g. your local neighborhood spambot this power - but I want to effectively communicate with people. I want to be effectively communicated to. Hell, I even want to be effectively advertizied to - it means they've picked up on how to avoid annoying me and serve my interests (e.g. I click a lot of webcomic ads.)
I have had so many conversations in so many chatrooms where conflicting or just plain ineffective communication styles lead to frustration on one end, or hurt feelings on another. I extol the virtues of reading various articles about effective communication - "How To Ask Questions The Smart Way" [1] and "What have you tried?" [2]. I've even written a few myself to explain my at times abrasive communication style - extoling it's virtues, defending my choice, and just plain explaining my rationale.
It's a great book where someone basically develops Crystal except it can compose messages too. Then it realizes that humans don't have to be in the loop at all..
BeautifulHandwrittenLetters.com