Why Was Silicon Valley So Obsessed with LK-99 Superconductor Claims?

What to make of the news that early research appears unable to duplicate the much-ballyhooed claims for the LK99 superconductor?
"The episode revealed the intense appetite in Silicon Valley for finding the next big thing," argues the Washington Post, "after years of hand-wringing that the tech world has lost its ability to come up with big, world-changing innovations, instead channeling all its money and energy into building new variations of social media apps and business software..."[M]any tec