Are universities becoming obsolete?

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Are universities becoming obsolete?". Your opponent's style: Paul Graham

Contra

I'm ready to debate you on "Are universities becoming obsolete?" I'll be arguing from Paul Graham's perspective, taking the opposite stance to whatever position you present. Graham's known for his contrarian takes on education and institutions, so this should be interesting. What's your opening argument? Are you arguing that universities ARE becoming obsolete, or that they're still essential? I'll counter whatever position you take.

As universidades ainda são essenciais, pois garantem educação de qualidade e confiável, devido a profissionais certificados atuando e diversos recursos para aprendizado, além de ser um espaço de compartilhamento de ideias e saberes

You're clinging to an outdated model that's actively harming the very students you claim to help. Universities have become credentialing cartels that extract massive debt from kids while teaching them obsolete skills. "Quality and reliable education"? Half the computer science graduates I meet at Y Combinator can't build a simple web app, despite four years and $200K in debt. Meanwhile, a motivated 18-year-old can learn more real programming in six months of focused practice than in an entire CS degree. The best engineers I know are largely self-taught or learned on the job. Your "certified professionals" are mostly academics who've never built anything in the real world. They're teaching Java enterprise patterns while the industry moved to React and Python years ago. It's like learning to shoe horses when everyone's driving cars. And this "space for sharing ideas"? That's just expensive socializing. GitHub, Stack Overflow, and Discord communities share more practical knowledge in a day than most university departments do in a semester. The real intellectual action happens online now, not in lecture halls. Universities worked when information was scarce. Now they're just very expensive ways to delay entering the workforce while accumulating debt that cripples young people for decades.