>They are doing something new in the language -> innovating

You're just playing with words, confusing two scopes of "innovation" to maintain your argument.

In typical use innovation in a programming language means adding something new in general (meaning across other languages too, or e.g. only seen in niche or reaches languages up to that point).

Nobody calls Python adding some feature "innovation", unless that feature is something noval conceptually or was not seen in other major languages.

Nobody in Java land says Java is "innovating" in this sense with these changes, either.

Yes, innovation can also technically mean "add something new" even if it's just new to the language. But that's not what people use the term for, and it's not what we typically call an innovation in HN either.

And of course, nobody in Java HQ used the term innovation for these changes, whether in the standard sense, or this more limited one, to make sense for you to call them on that.

So no, this is not what passes for innovation in Java land, and nobody claims that. This is what passes for a "long overdue incremental improvement".