If the steno code can be hand waved away with a "everything can display hex" then it isn't shitty, because that is true, and everyone will dismiss it. Half of haxoring is social manipulation and a quarter is brute force. It would be an effective obfuscation for 99.9% of people, that comes with a built-in out. And, since the claim is that it is a key, it is still not worth more than being able to say that NYP is transferring PGP keys...to the world. Keys are Meaningless without a Lock. Who has the lock is the interesting question. I agree there are better ways, but if your target only has a potato to work on, or has to go through, a perhaps, tech dumb third or fourth party, or if the sender isn't actually a steno guy, this method would be easy, simple and sufficient.