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You literally gave an example for why free-market capitalism supports innovation; e.g. the product was stupid and the market rejected it.

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The market rejecting a product has nothing to do with innovation. It's people saying I can't afford this or I don't value this at the price you're selling it at, or even I don't like the politics of someone that works for you. But it says nothing about if a product is innovative or not.

Innovation includes factors like actually being able to manufacture the product at a price people are willing to pay. If something is worth at most $10, coming up with a novel way to do it for less than $10 is innovative; coming up with a way to do it for $1000 is just wasting time.

It's easy to come up with crazy, impractical ideas. The essence of innovation is turning those ideas into sustainable, marketable, and thus profitable products.

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