Of course that isn't without it's own pitfalls. That lacking area might need a bunch of pre-requisite knowledge you also don't have and would do if you had adopted a traditional approach early on. It also may lead you further into the rabbit hole if you don't put a stop to it somewhere along the way and turn back to the original problem.
Right now I feel that you have to be able to mix and match the approaches. Reserve some time for just-in-time and rabbit holes, but also remember to reserve some time for fundamentals too, in order to prepare for future lessons. So it is important to do a bit of studying about the subject in order to understand if that's the right fit or not for you.
Actually, I think the real drive for any kind of learning is about the same for anyone: curiosity.
My rabbit-holing doesn't always resemble your approach; I often end up reading a book on a topic I'm just interested in, without a particular project or feeling of lacking knowledge. However, I try to transition myself into more JIT-learning/pull-learning style, so that I learn things at the same time I try to get something useful&interesting done. This mindshift is probably mostly due to HN (and we're looping back to rabbit-holing :)) - especially the prevailing emphasis on 'shipping the damn thing'.
Tests and exams are there to ensure you have done the hard non-fun-stuff as well as the fun-stuff and to "prove" you have understood, not just regurgitating half-comprehended factoids. You are advocating the equivalent of a educational junk food diet, the only thing you'll absorb is the superficially interesting and the crap.
Serendipity has its place but if it is your principal approach then you are delusional.
New favorite word.
- Master degree (as in, formal title; it may come in handy)
- Access to expensive/difficult to get equipment - for all those
crazy ideas of mine that involve e.g. a piece of custom hardware
- Access to people who know some particular area inside out
- All the smart people who study at the university - there won't be
any other chance to meet so many amazing people and maybe Build
Something Amazing with them, and then keep contact for the future.
- Cheaper tickets for public transport.
I'd argue that you ARE there for knowledge just not the kind that universities tend to say they give you.
Rather it's the kind of knowledge that the University system was supposed to give you before they all turned into job training, especially telling is "Access to people who know some particular area inside out". That's what university is supposed to be about.
Of course cheap bus is nice too.
I know a qualified BSc mechanical engineer who works in a supermarket for wage scraps.
I do sometimes feel that it's not the optimal way of learning things. I try to find the balance between random-walking and systematized learning, but one thing I'm sure of, it's that the optimum is not on the side of formal education, at least not for me.
After trying, again and again, to force and fit myself into 'the System' of traditional, formalized learning I discovered that it is almost impossible for me, and it always have been. Learning what I'm told to learn for sake of tests and exams just repells me, causing almost physical pain. So I'm not trying to force myself anymore, I decided to do what I have to do with minimum effort, and spend the rest of the time learning what I want, the way I want, and allowing myself time for rabbit-holing and procrastinating.