Why is YAC suddenly deemed "dead"?
Everyone has an opinion

I'm actually buying hardware specifically for YAC at this time. Beave162 and I have been tweaking and tuning for a few weeks now. Returns have been good so far - the coin is slightly undervalued right now, so everyone is being advised to hold them

Difficulty is also dropping as some miners seem to be searching for alternatives. Meaning that you can expect more YAC per day with the same hardware.
Out of curiosity: what hardware did you select for optimal YAC mining? In my opinion, GTX 660Ti cards are pretty solid scrypt-jane miners at a good price/performance point.