If YC is grad school, then Hacker News is on-line university.
The links to good articles are the curriculum.
The links to good references are the text books.
The debates and discussions are the study groups.
The "Ask HN" posts are the mentorships.
The projects we push each other to do are independent studies.
The community is my adult fraternity.
I've been here 4 years - I oughta try to get my diploma.
[Aside: Kinda ironic that your blog banner has a picture of my graduate school. The University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Business was in the 42 story Cathedral of Learning (the tall building on the right) where we took higher education quite literally.]