J2ME is mostly dead; I think it lives on as an option for interactive content on Blu-Ray though. But just because it's dead now doesn't necessarily mean it was a gimmick that went nowhere, IMHO.
Obviously, write once, run everywhere didn't apply. But Nokia Series 40 was J2ME plus some Nokia extras and had pretty big install numbers until it petered out. Of course, I think all the J2ME platforms had platform extras, if not just platform quirks. Of course, Nokia platforms more or less disappeared in the US somewhere 2005ish (reportedly over disputes about shipping phones with a built in SIP client), and their worldwide popular models were virtually invisible to US population and US based tech news; only after moving to Windows Phone 7 did Nokia phones start showing up in the US in volume again.
Android didn't want to pay for a J2ME license, so they just put actual Java on there (or cough totally not Java cough, but happens to be mechanically translatable from JVM bytecode, depending on how close to a courtroom you are). Having file streams that you can seek in both directions is super handy, so Android has expanded to fill the niche that J2ME phones took on.
Obviously, write once, run everywhere didn't apply. But Nokia Series 40 was J2ME plus some Nokia extras and had pretty big install numbers until it petered out. Of course, I think all the J2ME platforms had platform extras, if not just platform quirks. Of course, Nokia platforms more or less disappeared in the US somewhere 2005ish (reportedly over disputes about shipping phones with a built in SIP client), and their worldwide popular models were virtually invisible to US population and US based tech news; only after moving to Windows Phone 7 did Nokia phones start showing up in the US in volume again.
Android didn't want to pay for a J2ME license, so they just put actual Java on there (or cough totally not Java cough, but happens to be mechanically translatable from JVM bytecode, depending on how close to a courtroom you are). Having file streams that you can seek in both directions is super handy, so Android has expanded to fill the niche that J2ME phones took on.