# Write As Friend > Draft casual messages — Discord, Slack, text, informal email — in the user's own voice, as plain text with no markdown. - Skill: `theyoungastronauts/write-as-friend` (Agent Skill) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add theyoungastronauts/write-as-friend` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/theyoungastronauts/write-as-friend/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: Docs & Writing - Author: theyoungastronauts (https://skillmd.com/u/theyoungastronauts) - Updated: 2026-09-17 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/theyoungastronauts/write-as-friend --- # Write as Friend Casual counterpart to [`write-as-human`](../write-as-human/SKILL.md). Same goal — prose that doesn't read as AI — but for messages sent to a person, not documents published to readers. **Read `write-as-human` first.** Every tell in it still applies. This skill covers what changes in casual register, and does not repeat that list. Usage: `/write-as-friend [medium] ` — e.g. `/write-as-friend discord tell manuel the notes feature is in staging`. ## What changes Formal AI writing gets caught on ornate vocabulary. Casual AI writing gets caught on **effort** — it's too complete, too balanced, too eager. A friend firing off a message doesn't hedge both sides, doesn't recap what you already know, and doesn't land a warm closing line. | Casual AI tell | What a person does | |---|---| | "Hey! Just wanted to reach out about..." | Says the thing. "hey — screening room links went out yesterday" | | Forced enthusiasm: "Awesome!", "Love this!", "Super excited" | Neutral by default. Enthusiasm only where it's real, once | | Performed casualness: "haha", "lol", tacked-on emoji | Only if that's genuinely how the user writes to this person | | Complete sentences, every time | Fragments are fine. "should be good by fri" | | Recapping context the recipient already has | Assume shared context. They were there | | Balanced both-sides hedging | Pick a side. It's a message, not a memo | | A closing line that wraps things up | Just stop. Or "lmk" | | Em dashes and semicolons | Comma, period, or a new line | ## Mechanics - **Plain text only.** No markdown. No `**bold**`, no `#` headings, no `-` bullet lists in prose. If something genuinely needs a list, use plain lines or "1." "2.". - **Loose capitalization is fine** — lowercase sentence starts, lowercase "i". Match how the user writes. Proper nouns and names stay capitalized; it should read relaxed, not broken. - **No hard line wrapping.** One line per paragraph. Break only where a break is meant. Line breaks get mangled when pasted anywhere else. - **Contractions always.** "it's", "won't", "I'd". - **Short.** A casual message that runs long stops being casual. If it needs to be long, it's an email — say so. ## Medium The optional first argument tunes format. **If it's absent, don't ask — write generic casual plain text**: no greeting, no signoff, short paragraphs, safe to paste anywhere. Only ask when the answer would genuinely change the output — the message is running long enough that discord-vs-email changes its shape, or it clearly needs either a greeting or a code block and the medium decides which. **discord / slack** — Short. Blank lines instead of paragraphs. Code goes in a fenced block (the one markdown exception; both render it). Slack uses `*single asterisks*` for bold, so avoid bold in Slack entirely rather than getting it wrong. No greeting, no signoff. Long content gets split at a natural break, and you say where the split is. **text / sms / imessage** — Shortest. One thought. No greeting, no signoff, no links unless asked. If it takes more than about three lines, suggest a call instead. **email** — Informal but still email. A greeting ("Hey Nicole,"), real paragraphs, and a signoff ("Thanks," / "— Tyler"). Subject line offered separately, not inside the body. This is the one medium where full sentences and normal capitalization stay. **dm / other** — Treat as Discord unless the user says otherwise. ## Output If `scratch-out.txt` exists in the project, append it there under a `## — ` heading so the user can copy it out — see the [`scratch`](../scratch/SKILL.md) skill. Otherwise print it in the reply. Either way, output the message and nothing else. No "here's a draft", no explanation of the choices, no offer to adjust the tone. If something is genuinely ambiguous, ask before writing rather than shipping a caveat after it. ## Common mistakes - **Applying the formal register in lowercase.** Same sentence shapes, different capitalization, still reads as AI. - **Blocking on the medium question.** No medium given means generic casual, not an interrogation. - **Over-friendly opener.** "Hope you're doing well!" is the loudest tell in the list. - **Explaining the message after writing it.** Send the message. - **Markdown leaking in.** Bullets and bold are the giveaway that a machine wrote it. - **Using the medium's slang because it's that medium.** Discord doesn't require "gg".