Do you need a degree? No, you don't.<p>Do you need the skills a degree provides? Yes, you do.<p>Will you develop those skills on your own <i>in the same amount of time</i>? Maybe not? You could if you wanted, but I have found that people generally study "the fun stuff" on their own, and only study the hard stuff "when it comes up at work". One advantage of a degree is that being in school gives you hard deadlines for stuff you don't want to do.<p>Developing muscles in only "the fun stuff" will send you down a different career path initially, you might find.<p>Other benefits of school include meeting people who can get you a job at the place they work, and vice versa. That's what networking means. It might not even be an active thing, if you just happen to know someone, and they know you can do something, you're going to be the first person they call when they need that, rather than a total stranger.<p>It's possibly also easier to get a foot in the door in particular technical niches if you have a degree, since it can be difficult to get experience in some things "as a hobby or side project", but easy to get experience with in a school.<p>This ain't rocket science, it's life 101, but if you don't have someone in your life to give you this advice, you learn it the hard way (i.e., it takes a long time...).<p>You can do it all without school, or you can do it with school, there are pros and cons, and the calculus changes with your personal situation, your family wealth, your personal network, etc.<p>There's no single perfect answer here.