Andreas Fackler did depart but it was out of interest in new challenges 
what he did with routing was nothing short of amazing and we’re all big fans but he was in good company at maidsafe. They are a very capable team and growing. For us that have been here for awhile we’ve seen some twists and turns but the overall vision, including the technical details, are all coming together.
I’ll have to check out the project you’re mentioning but what has always differentiated SAFE for me is how decentralized it is. Every node just holds tiny pieces of encrypted data, never a whole file. IP addresses are scrubbed after the first hop so far more private and secure than TOR. Consensus is reached through close groups better known as sections now rather than block chains that require every node to download hundreds of gigabytes or more. I’ll try to update with some good links for you. Welcome to the forum!