All Afizz Over the New Coke

Talk goes better with Coke. At wedding receptions, graduation parties, offices, homes and supermarkets, Coke's decision to change for the first time in 99 years the taste of the world's best-selling soft drink has become a universal conversation topic, like the weather or money or love. Everyone has an opinion: some like the new Coke, some hate it, others do not care at all. Some believe Coca-Cola's strategists made the marketing coup of the decade, others call it a monumental blunder.

The complainers, not surprisingly, are popping off loudest. To them, changing the taste of the real thing was like tampering...