I haven't read through other peoples post here but I have gone through this.
I am from India, and my reasosn were a bit different. I had failed in my final class in school (12th). Right before you are supposed to apply for college. I had science. Except for Computer Science I sucked at everything.
And I was like really fed up and I gave up on studies entirely.
Told my parents about it. They tried making me understand but I said this stuff doesn't go in my head.
Finally they gave in. And I joined my dads business.
For 4 years I tried doing that stuff, And I realized that I am not cut out for it.
One day, me, my dad and my uncle met. And My dad was trying to ask him to take me up as a partner in his firm while he'll invest.
My uncle said straightforward, "look, If its money, I can get it from banks. It's about the knowledge and what he can add to the company. Why don't you ask him to get back to studies?"
And that started this whole pursuit of trying again.
Told my parents I'll try to clear my last year in school again, did it somehow via distance learning. Cleared it.
Finally Got an admission in decent Engineering college and got into I.T.
First 3 years I had no clue what I was doing, why am I here, while I would do great in practicals, I would do horrible in theory.
In 3rd year, I failed one theory subject 4 times which is like a year down (basically you have to clear that one subject within a year and wait till you clear it)
I was like WTF.
And I told myself I'll just learn things on my own.
First thing I did was setup Ubuntu on my machine.
Unfortunately WIFI just would not work.
Wasted a week, luckily Ubuntu 10.04 (I think) came out and It just worked! :D
And I began my jounrey of self-learning.
One good thing that happened to me was due to a year down, all my friends passed out and joined several big companies. And I saw that these big companies care too much about marks.
And I decided not to apply to anyone of them coz they'll reject me even before trying to know me.
And I told myself, one year down the line, i'll get a job without applying via college, "off-campus", on my own.
And I would attend all kinds of meetups, events, updated my github profile, updated my FB (kept it clean), wrote blog posts etc....
After a year on FB I got a message from one startup about writing some python scrapers for them as a freelancer. I did it for 2 months. Also I was doing my final year project under someone. They both offered me a job. And one person I met in a python conference. I got a job offer from him as well.
I landed up a job at Helpshift. These guys don't care about your degree, your "years of experience" etc. Just pure knowledge.
It's been almost 2 years I've been working here, and life is good.
So was degree really required? No.
Is it a good to have? Yes.
Is it a must Have? No, depends.
Its all upto you, what path you wanna create.
By doing X you open certain gates up, and close some others.
If you study on your own, and chart your own path, you make it easier for yourself to study exactly what you want, but you close other gates like Trying for a company like Google perhaps which may not reject you but will definetly make it it harder for you.
If you do get a degree, you keep your options open but you'll have to go through this whole cycle.
So again, both have its tradeoffs.
Do I regret dropping off? No. I learned to value knowledge (Not degree btw).
I would just say, choose the path that you'll regret the least. Everyone who tells you that you are doing wrong, are saying from what they have seen or their experiences. They could be wrong too you know, just like you might be too.
Whats more important is what would you regret less if it does not work out in the future? Choose that. And just give your everything to it, Degree or No Degree.
All the best to you.
:)