I enjoyed the read. I'm a fastmail user and I didn't pick it for real privacy but because it's not Google. It's better than Gmail, more features, looks better, faster etc.
I don't know how any email provider can provide real privacy since they have to scan for spam, malware, and so on.
Fastmail is part of the 5 eyes surveillance network as well: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Eyes