It's a DM-specific solution to what nostr:nprofile1qqsrhuxx8l9ex335q7he0f09aej04zpazpl0ne2cgukyawd24mayt8gprfmhxue69uhhq7tjv9kkjepwve5kzar2v9nzucm0d5hszxmhwden5te0wfjkccte9emk2um5v4exucn5vvhxxmmd9uq3xamnwvaz7tmhda6zuat50phjummwv5hsx7c9z9 was trying to do with decoupling encryption and identity: https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nips/pull/1647
This is cool in the sense you can have a mode where you have to establish a link before you can start communicating, this is something nostr:npub12262qa4uhw7u8gdwlgmntqtv7aye8vdcmvszkqwgs0zchel6mz7s6cgrkj tried to do awhile back but this appears to achieve the same thing? Just send a giftwrap of key aliases to the user to let them know how to contact you. Neat.
Discussion
Maybe there is a broader way to do all nostr encryptions via aliases, but I don't see it yet (a use-case-agnostic scheme gets too complicated too quickly)
One thing at a time i guess, i can at least wrap my head around and design around the more focused usecase of alias keys in nip17
We should definitely be moving toward device keys across the board