MAKING A LIVING

A vast YouTube audience (Sailing Uma has 86,000 subscribers as we went to press; most popular video ‘Hurricane survival tactics’ has been viewed 586,000 times) can be parlayed into sponsorship – select products will be supplied free of charge in return for an agreed amount of air time – and payment in kind, a sort of barter system where marine goods and services will be provided in return for ‘mentions’ on film. Plus Dan and Kika sell merchandise.

But some of the most successful video bloggers (vloggers) now have

paid-up subscribers via elaborate, multi-tiered membership plans on websites such as Patreon. These subscribers (patrons) get exclusive access to the vloggers, early videos, extra footage and discounts on merchandise as well. Dan and Kika now earn about $1,000 per month from their 600 patrons, which goes a long way to supplementing the other less reliable sources of cash and goods. “The way we see Patreon is not sort of like donations ... we see it is more like a subscription. What we do for free is for free, but if you want something more then you’ve got to sign up for it.”