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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 fo ...
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, spor ...
or
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 ...
of an author usually not affiliated with the publication's editorial board. Op-eds are different from both editorials (opinion pieces submitted by editorial board members) and letters to the editor (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 of '' The New York Evening World''. 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 ''
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 ...
'' editor
John B. Oakes John Bertram Oakes (April 23, 1913 – April 5, 2001) was an iconoclastic and influential U.S. journalist known for his early commitment to the environment, civil rights, and opposition to the Vietnam War. Background John Bertram Oakes was born ...
. 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, 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 n ...
'' 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.


See also

* Feuilleton *
Pundit A pundit is a person who offers mass media opinion or commentary on a particular subject area (most typically politics, the social sciences, technology or sport). Origins The term originates from the Sanskrit term ('' '' ), meaning "knowledg ...


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