Lesson #6

> Flashiness leads to immediate recognition, but silver and its faint glint glows over time (2025.11.10)

If you research something trendy, of course, you're more likely to be published. Just like if you produce typical shonen with flashy graphics, it will become popular. Case in point - Demon Slayer is immensely popular especially since part 1 of the Infinity Castle arc has been released. It is extremely easy to find merch. Compare that to Gintama, where even with the release of Ginpachi-sensei, merch is rare. Now back to research, COVID-19 was the perfect "exogenous shock" and highly relevant, hence there were many papers on the topic. I get that it's relevant and good for preparing for the future. It doesn't mean that papers which don't focus on COVID-19 are suddenly less valuable, but these papers are suddenly rather boring given more "exciting events". Anyway, it's OK to be the Gintama of papers. It's also OK to just be. In episode 4 of Ginpachi-sensei, we learn that it's OK to just continue living because there may be better anime and manga in the future.