

Building a new way does not adequately means giving up on developer verification. In the last paragraph, Google is also promoting the verification for non-GPlay developers.
Out of all possibilities in this universe, there may be a chance that these new flows include user verification instead of developer.
There should also be a rule to rephrase “sideloading” as “installing from non-Google-approved sources” at this point.

The blog also stated that FUTO repeatedly gave money to other FOSS projects without following proper process for institutional sponsors, and stick their names onto their front page.
Aside from that, their own projects are source-available at best.