Promoting Innovation: A Crucial Value of Free Expression

As someone who is extremely involved with the sports media industry on the college level, I always try to find ways to separate myself from the rest. In such a competitive environment, it is important to set myself apart in any way necessary, including experimenting with new things that I might not be comfortable with in order to improve my craft. Because of this, I personally connected with the 7th value of free expression the most- promoting innovation. Promoting innovation is a great way for people from all walks of life to contribute to society and continuously advance the world we live in.

With such a fast-growing world, it seems like new ideas and creations are required every single day. It’s very easily seen in almost all markets, with technology being a very prominent one- there’s a new iPhone coming out every 10 months. However, innovation as a definition can mean very different things; for instance, what one considers innovative is completely up to them. On a personal level, I find that anything new or different that I do that has the opportunity to improve my life in some way, regardless of if I create it or not, is innovative. When I am commentating games, I will always look for new vocabulary, voice inflection, or just about anything to spice up the way I announce. While I know this isn’t a revolutionary thing and everyone improves their own skills, I find it innovative to myself because I’m changing up what I was doing, even in a minor way.

While my personal experience with promoting innovation is unique in its own right, innovation can be anything from individual success all the way to a billion dollar enterprise coming up with a new tactic to earn revenue. Innovation is the prime factor when it comes to the success of businesses, as creating new ways to market what they’re selling (as well as finding new things to sell) is crucial to the amount of revenue a business/company will receive. The separation from other companies due to promoting innovation will almost always bode well. It is also good for society, as bringing a sense of distinctiveness into the world allows for other businesses to grow and become better. Without innovation, the world would stay the same and be much more bland and boring.

A great way to measure the importance of innovation is to take a look at social media. There are so many social media apps nowadays, some with over 1 billion users. While a lot of these apps share similar qualities, almost all of them are different in their own way. Snapchat is primarily used as a messaging app, Instagram’s main focus is around sharing photos, Youtube and TikTok are for creating videos, and that’s just 4 of the bigger ones. One thing that all of these platforms share in common, however, is the fact that they were once created with a focus of gaining a database of users that would bring in revenue. Social media is such an innovative market, as there are so many changing things in the world that all apps have to keep up with. Platforms are constantly making updates and feeding off of each others’ success in an attempt to increase the revenue they are bringing in. Because of this, social media users are lucky to be in the golden age, where the top priority is making sure minimal goes wrong. Social media has become such a big part of everyone’s lives, especially recently due to the increase in technology and the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic required things from everyone that no one had ever gone through before, and plenty of people were able to profit off that. Platforms like TikTok shined during that time frame, as the app developed a massive database of users during a time where people could only turn to their phones for entertainment. Social media will continue to grow, and that’s because innovation in that market will never stop being a necessity.

All in all, promoting innovation can mean plenty of different things. What one person sees as innovative may mean absolutely nothing to the next. Innovation truly makes the world go round, and society is better as a whole because of the promotion of innovation.