Dead coin?
Not hardly... how would you conclude to say that? its has a network hash of over 20Gh and growing, and is actively trading on Bittrex. It has become an asset for everyone who mines LTC on most larger pools, that also host uLTC as a merged mined coin.
So, the answer is no, it by far is not a "dead coin"
The other Umbrella coins forth coming, will offer the same asset protections that uLTC does now. I look for uBTC to be very big and wide spread as it is put in place by mining pools for BTC, which most will offer merged mining for that. Yes we all are anxious to see them launched, but the dev is making sure all is in place after uLTC launch and perfecting the concept before moving forward with the others, which is a wise thing to do.