The question Do you need a degree ... was closed as off-topic as it clearly applied to any area of development, not specifically open/free content development.This question is a re-framing, but very specifically from the open/free side. However, some background is required to properly do so.At the time I completed high school, degrees in software engineering (as opposed to computer science) were few and far between. After taking a brief - privately run - course, I was easily able to get hired as a programmer. No interviewer even questioned my lack of degree - they were more interested in what I could do.That has all changed today. Here in California, a degree of any kind is considered necessary to even begin searching for a job - and not just in software. I know many people with degrees in business or marketing filling posts we would once have considered 'menial'. It is a standing joke here that the University of California will soon be offering a Bachelors of Retail Science to help people get work as checkout operators at supermarkets - and that the supermarkets will then demand applicants have this degree.However, focusing on creative domains such as software engineering and the arts, the open/free content movement appears to have no such barrier to entry.Are there indications that this movement is opening the way for unqualified people to find positions in their respective industry?Possible sub-questions:Are there statistics about the average age of contributors to major open projects?Similarly for their qualifications?Are there well known examples of non-degreed people moving from the open world into professional positions on the strength of their published work?In short, can an early dedication to open/free content creation help you bypass the cost of a University education? Does this increase the equality of opportunity for the less well off?EDIT:Lest people think my comment about the California job market is just an urban myth, vague feelig, or localized phenomenon, see this quoteThe Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that total employment is expected to increase by 20.5 million jobs from 2010 to 2020, with 88 percent of detailed occupations projected to experience employment growth. In the midst of all this, jobs requiring a masters degree are expected to grow the fastest, while those requiring a high school diploma will experience the slowest growth over the 2010- 20 time frame.From the article By 2018, 60 percent of job openings will require college education. The article itself is not a primary source but it cites (or at least quotes) BLS statistics and reports to support the headline.Further The Economist devoted a large part of its January 24, 2015 Edition to issues surrounding college education, its social and financial costs, and the growing gap in equality of opportunity.
Does the open/free content movement lower the barriers of entry for non-qualified people?
accessibility;software development
Historically, many people have become professionals in coding without benefit of a degree, your perception of the California job market notwithstanding. A CEO whom I know well, amongst many others of my middle-aged peers, is an example.When I hire people, I put a lot of emphasis on 'portfolio', and I know that I'm not alone. Open source is certainly convenient for this, but it didn't exist when many of my peers were launching their careers sans degree. So I don't see how it's possible to quantify the incremental effect of open source. It's entirely possible to create a portfolio on github.com entirely of one's own work, with no collaboration with open source projects.In any case, there's a catch-22 that applies to your thesis. You have to know how to do useful work to contribute to an open source project. It's hard to do that without either studying the subject or getting yourself hired by someone who will teach you. But, if you do manage to teach yourself to the point of obtaining real skill, chances are that you can get a job whether or not you have ever submitted a patch to an open source project.In my time contributing to open source projects, I've never seen any evidence that anyone met your profile of bootstrapping themselves this way. Of course, no one has to reveal this. Or reveal their age, which would make it rather difficult to answer some of your other questions.Every few months, someone shows up at the Apache Software Foundation wanting to do a study or survey to learn something about who is involved in open source projects. If I had $10 for each such thing I've participated, I could buy a new camera. I can't tell you whether any of this has led to publication-quality research, but arxiv might yield something.Examples:Understanding the motivations, participation, and performance of open source software developers: A longitudinal study of the Apache projectsor Exploring the Impact of Socio-Technical Core-Periphery Structures in Open Source Software Development