If a Twitterbird chirps on DM, and there's no one to hear it, does it make a sound?

Twitter recently announced that they will be changing the rules for DMs (Direct Messages). Previously, Direct Messages could only be sent between two parties that followed one another, often resulting in tedious exchanges like this:

• To fix a spelling mistake on my @united ticket... I'm told I need to purchase a new ticket. No #customerservice or @staralliance love.
• @United Follow me so I can DM you.
• @customer Please follow us so that we may DM you back.

What does this mean? Well, one of two things:

1. You could potentially get a floodgate of DM spam. Since the feature is off by default, if you don't want to run that risk, don't turn it on.

2. Enterprises will now find it much easier to use Twitter as a pseudo-chat client, since (if they turn the feature on) any of their customers with complaints or problems will be able to DM their customer service channel instead of sending open @ discussions. 

The interesting thing will be to see how many people opt to communicate with companies this way. One of the more satisfying elements of complaining on social media is that those complaints are public. So by Tweeting "@united you screwed me over again with a late flight", you not only generally got customer service, but also the ability to tell all your friends of your displeasure at the same time.

In addition, because so many social media customer service exchanges were done in the public eye, social teams tended to be more friendly and responsive on the whole, since they were basically also PR reps. If more people turn to DMs, will this behavior change?

Finally, if more exchanges are done completely in private, companies will find it harder to benchmark sentiment against their competition.

Fascinating times, indeed.