If it’s 1000 unsuccessful searches for the same thing, then sure, I wouldn’t have much hope for search #1001. But LK-99 was a new material of a type that hadn’t come up in this context before, and there’s no reason to assume that room-temperature superconductivity is literally impossible.

Heck, the Em drive had plenty of reason to think it was literally impossible, and IMO it was still worth the effort that went into checking it out. We’ve been wrong about impossibilities before.

I think the main thing that bothered me is that for a lot of people it wasn’t "give me more evidence before I bother”. It was “give me more evidence before anyone else should bother.” They seemed outright hostile to the notion that we should be checking this out, often jumping straight to “it’s a scam, they’re trying to do a fraud.” It doesn’t sound like you were in that camp so you’re probably not in that picture after all. Perhaps just a bit out of frame to the side, but that’s okay. :)