Being a self-taught developer myself who has landed some incredibly impressive jobs including a 2 year contract with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC News) as a developer amongst other awesome places, I agree with the statement of college being a waste of money.<p>I completed high school, contemplated college but then decided to get a job instead. Every place I have ever worked at has mentioned that they prefer hiring self-taught programmers as opposed to educated ones because the passion is already there and just because you can complete college doesn't mean you can handle the pressures of a programming environment in the real world (late hours, tight deadlines, last minute issues before major launches etc).<p>It's about damn time that non-educated programmers and non-programmers alike who know their stuff start getting more recognition and better pay to suit. I've had to work damn hard to earn the salary I do now and I know more than a lot of the other programmers here who went to college, I teach them stuff and I thought it was meant to be the other way around.