The novelty of new products creates uncertainty for market participants, forcing them to evaluate the usefulness of new products relative to existing offerings. We theorize market participants engage in discourse – the objective information and subjective opinion exchanged in the marketplace – to determine the usefulness of new products. We develop theory to explain how the degree of novelty of new products impacts market discourse, which is used as a sensemaking mechanism to reduce uncertainty caused by the new products, and test the theory with data from the United States wireless telephone industry from 1998 to 2007. Results suggest a greater degree of new product novelty is associated with a longer duration, higher volume, and higher conflict of discourse. We also demonstrate the moderating effects of firm- and product-level characteristics, such as firm reputation, product price, and the introduction of new products by competitors, on the level and duration of market discourse.