"And I think both the left and the right should celebrate people who have different opinions, and disagree with them, and argue with them, and differ with them, but don't just try to shut them up." -- Roger Ebert
While the op-ed as we know it has been around for nearly a century, the formats in which people can voice their opinions are rapidly changing.
If you have a point of view on a particular topic, you don't have to wait to publish in the daily newspaper. Rather, you can leverage a whole slew of other channels. Most industry publications accept contributed content (although that is starting to change as well), sites like LinkedIn and Medium offer quick and easy ways to distribute your perspective to the masses, or you can always start your own blog using the likes of Weebly, Squarespace, Wordpress or Wix (like we have here).
While all articles, whether editorial or opinion, should be well researched and based on facts, opinion pieces are just that -- opinions. Not everyone is going to agree with the author's perspective. That's not only good, that's healthy. We need to have differing opinions on important industry topics in order to keep things balanced.
Unless there is a blatant and verifiable inaccuracy that wasn't found prior to publication, there should never been a correction made to an opinion piece. Of course, all industry publications need to protect themselves and should include some sort of note saying that the views of the author may not reflect the perspective of the publication, but the whole point of accepting contributed articles from outside experts is to be able to provide readers with a variety of opinions.
If you don't like what was written, write a rebuttal opinion piece. Share your perspective and the facts that back up your argument on the topic. But to ask a publisher for a retraction or a correction, is inappropriate and unfair to the original author.
The formats have and will continue to change but we need to ensure that opinion pieces remain just that -- opinions.
