Robert McHenry

Robert Dale McHenry (born April 30, 1945) is the editor of a number of mainly biographical works and was Vice President and Editor-in-Chief of the Encyclopædia Britannica from 1992 to 1997.

Education

McHenry studied at Northwestern University and the University of Michigan.

Works

Writer of

• How to Know

Editor of

• Famous American Women: A Biographical Dictionary from Colonial Times to the Present
• Merriam-Websters American Biographers
• Webster's American Military Biographies

Co-editor of

• A documentary history of conservation in America
• Encyclopædia Britannica
• Liberty's Women
• The Temper of John Dryden
• Webster's American biographies
• Webster's Guide to American History: A Chronological, Geographical, and Biographical Survey and Compendium

Criticism of Wikipedia

In a 2004 article published on Tech Central Station, "The Faith-Based Encyclopedia", McHenry made several criticisms of the structure of Wikipedia. The core of his argument can be summarised as follows: Anyone can edit Wikipedia, no matter how ill-qualified. As a result, even a well-written article may degrade over time as ignorant or incompetent people make subsequent alterations. As a result, he argued that Wikipedia could never become a reliable source of information. McHenry used the Wikipedia article on Alexander Hamilton to illustrate his point.

McHenry concludes:

The user who visits Wikipedia to learn about some subject, to confirm some matter of fact, is rather in the position of a visitor to a public restroom. It may be obviously dirty, so that he knows to exercise great care, or it may seem fairly clean, so that he may be lulled into a false sense of security. What he certainly does not know is who has used the facilities before him.

McHenry's article set off a controversy. See the external links and discussion on the pages of the Wikipedia.

However, in a C-SPAN interview, Wikipedia's own Jimmy Wales revealed the two discussed matters over dinner, after the article was published. [1] Said Wales: "...he‘s a really very thoughtful, nice guy. So I don‘t actually know if he regrets this inflammatory rhetoric because now he‘s sort of gotten famous as the public toilet guy."

References

"McHenry, Robert". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved April 1 2005, from Encyclopædia Britannica Premium Service. (http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9345326).

External links

• The Faith-Based Encyclopedia – Robert McHenry's critique of Wikipedia
  • On Getting It – follow-up response by McHenry
  • The FUD-based Encyclopedia – a refutation by Aaron Krowne
    • McHenry responds to Aaron Krowne