It looks to me as if all the opinions thrown around in this thread, and indeed in every thread of its nature, can be boiled down to one thing:

People who did not go to college and do not have a degree think that it is better (or at least as good) to have technical experience but no degree, and preach it in order to justify to themselves that they did not fail themselves by skipping college. People who did go to college and did earn a degree tend to think that if you dont have a degree, you are worthless as an employee, and preach that in order to justify to themselves the time and money they might have wasted by attending college instead of acquiring real world experience.

Anyone else think this makes sense? It sure does to me.