An op-ed, short for "opposite the editorial page", is a written

prose Prose is a form of written or spoken language that follows the natural flow of speech, uses a language's ordinary grammatical structures, or follows the conventions of formal academic writing. It differs from most traditional poetry, where the f ...

piece, typically published by a North-American

newspaper A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as politics, business, sports a ...

magazine A magazine is a periodical publication, generally published on a regular schedule (often weekly or monthly), containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, purchase price, prepaid subscriptions, or by a combinatio ...

, which expresses the

opinion An opinion is a judgment, viewpoint, or statement that is not conclusive, rather than facts, which are true statements. Definition A given opinion may deal with subjective matters in which there is no conclusive finding, or it may deal with f ...

of an author usually not affiliated with the publication's

editorial board The editorial board is a group of experts, usually at a publication, who dictate the tone and direction the publication's editorial policy will take. Mass media At a newspaper, the editorial board usually consists of the editorial page editor, a ...

. Op-eds are different from both

editorials An editorial, or leading article (UK) or leader (UK) is an article written by the senior editorial people or publisher of a newspaper, magazine, or any other written document, often unsigned. Australian and major United States newspapers, such ...

(opinion pieces submitted by editorial board members) and

letters to the editor A letter to the editor (LTE) is a letter sent to a publication about an issue of concern to the reader. Usually, such letters are intended for publication. In many publications, letters to the editor may be sent either through conventional mai ...

(opinion pieces submitted by readers). In 2021, ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

''—the paper credited with developing and naming the modern op-ed page—announced that it was retiring the label, and would instead call submitted opinion pieces "Guest Essays." The move was a result of the transition to online publishing, where there is no concept of physically opposing (adjacent) pages.

Origin

The direct ancestor of the modern op-ed page was created in 1921 by

Herbert Bayard Swope Herbert Bayard Swope Sr. (; January 5, 1882 – June 20, 1958) was an American editor, journalist and intimate of the Algonquin Round Table. Swope spent most of his career at the ''New York World.'' He was the first and three-time recipient of t ...

of ''

The New York Evening World ''The Evening World'' was a newspaper that was published in New York City from 1887 to 1931. It was owned by Joseph Pulitzer, and served as an evening edition of the ''New York World.'' History The first issue was on October 10, 1887. It was pub ...

''. When Swope took over as main editor in 1920, he realized that the page opposite the editorials was "a catchall for book reviews, society boilerplate, and obituaries". He wrote: Swope included only opinions by employees of his newspaper, leaving the "modern" op-ed page to be developed in 1970 under the direction of ''

'' editor John B. Oakes. The first op-ed page of ''The New York Times'' appeared on 21 September 1970. Writes media scholar

Michael J. Socolow Michael J. Socolow (born December 19, 1968) is an American media historian and former broadcast journalist who teaches in the Department of Communication and Journalism at the University of Maine. Background and education He was raised in Washing ...

of Oakes' innovation:

The Times' effort synthesized various antecedents and editorial visions. Journalistic innovation is usually complex, and typically involves multiple external factors. The Times' op-ed page appeared in an era of democratizing cultural and political discourse and of economic distress for the company itself. The newspaper's executives developed a place for outside contributors with space reserved for sale at a premium rate for additional commentaries and other purposes.

Competition from radio and television

Beginning in the 1930s, radio began to threaten

print journalism Journalism is the production and distribution of reports on the interaction of events, facts, ideas, and people that are the "news of the day" and that informs society to at least some degree. The word, a noun, applies to the occupation (profe ...

, a process that was later accelerated by the rise of television. To combat this, major newspapers such as ''The New York Times'' and ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

'' began including more openly subjective and opinionated journalism, adding more columns and increasing the extent of their op-ed pages.

Possible conflicts of interest

The various connections between op-eds, editors, and funding from interest groups have raised concern. In 2011, in an open letter to ''The New York Times'', a group of U.S. journalists and academics called for

conflict of interest A conflict of interest (COI) is a situation in which a person or organization is involved in multiple interests, financial or otherwise, and serving one interest could involve working against another. Typically, this relates to situations i ...

transparency in op-eds.

References

External links

*
A robot wrote this entire article. Are you scared yet, human?
- the first op-ed completely written by an artificial intelligence (AI), published in September 2020 by ''The Guardian''
How to Write an Op-ed or ColumnClassic Op-Ed StructureThe Op-Ed ProjectHow to Write an Op-Ed video
{{authority control category:opinion journalism category:newspaper content category:essays

Origin

Competition from radio and television

Possible conflicts of interest

See also

References

External links