Mark Stephens was born in 1953, in Apple Creek, Ohio. He is married to Mary Alyce. Stephens was the third author to contribute to Infoworld under the Cringely pseudonym, the first two being Rory J. O'Connor and then Laurie Flynn. During his lengthy tenure (1987—1995), the character of Cringely changed dramatically (morphing from a private eye type to a slick, womanizing tech insider), and became an increasingly popular tech pundit after writing the book How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their Millions, Battle Foreign Competition and Still Can't Get a Date (1992, ISBN 0-88730-855-4).

After a financial disagreement in 1995, Stephens was dismissed from Infoworld, and was promptly sued by IDG to prevent him from continuing to use the Cringely trademark. A settlement was reached out of court that allowed him to use the name, so long as he did not contribute to competing technology magazines. As a result, Stephens' writing as Robert X. Cringely regularly appears in publications such as The New York Times, Newsweek, Forbes, Upside, Success, and Worth. Stephens has also appeared as Cringely in two documentaries based on his writings: The Rise of Accidental Empires and A Brief History of the Internet. He also appeared in a three part documentary on PBS called Plane Crazy, in which he attempted to build an aircraft in 30 days...and fly it when completed.

Until late 2008, Stephens' Cringely wrote an online column for the PBS website called I, Cringely: The Pulpit, and produced an Internet television show NerdTV, also for PBS. On November 14, 2008, Stephens announced that he will stop contributing columns to PBS as of December 15. He indicated that the move is his own decision "and not that of PBS, which has been nothing but good to me these many years."

He also blogged for the Technology Evangelist site during 2007.

Today, his writings can be found at his own I, Cringely site and on Adam Smith's Money World.

InfoWorld.com continues to publish the "Robert X. Cringely" Notes From the Field column as a blog, written by technology journalist Daniel Tynan.

Cringely currently resides in Charleston, South Carolina.

Stanford

Stephens earned a bachelor's degree from the College of Wooster in Ohio in 1975.

In 1998, it was revealed that Stephens had falsely claimed to have received a Ph.D. from Stanford University and to have been employed as a professor there. Stanford's administration stated that while Stephens had been a teaching assistant and had pursued course work toward a doctoral degree, he had never held a professorship nor had he been awarded the degree. Stephens then stated that while he had received a master's degree from the department of communications and completed the classes and tests required for the Ph.D., he acknowledged that he failed to complete his dissertation. Asked about the resulting controversy, Stephens told a reporter: "[A] new fact has now become painfully clear to me: you don't say you have the Ph.D unless you really have the Ph.D."