do you think he may still be in contact with the "old" people or the core developers?
Do I think that?
No.
I already said:
Personally, my guess is that he's dead.
Maybe he gives them hints on what to improve, but doesn't want to foster the cult-following...
I doubt it. The current developers are a talented group of programmers. They decide for themselves what they want to work on. I doubt many of them would care much what Satoshi thinks should be done.