In my opinion Assange was captured or killed back when the deadman switch was released.
His accounts were compromised and taken over by other entities.
Those that haven taken out Assange are doing their best to hold the illusion:
In order to try and keep the deception, those in control staged a
"I am Julian Assange founder of WikiLeaks -- Ask Me Anything"
This gives the perception Julian Assange is alive and well.
But don't be fooled...
Assange warned long ago that if he could not verify the Digital Proof of Life key, then in all likely hood Wikileaks has been compromised, in the AMA with Reddit he was presented with that question as users looked for this "Digital Assange" to verify the Key but instead ignored the requests and continued on with the show.
The deception and introduction of
"Digital Julian Assange" was produced through such technology as