My Patreon Goal and Sneak Preview.

So I wanted to take a moment to tell everyone how things are looking financially speaking, towards my goal of going full time on YouTube.  I still get a ton of comments begging me to "upload more often."  Granted, most of those people aren't funding me on Patreon, but that's not surprising. I also wanted to tell you how your money is getting used currently.  Some of this is a little personal, but I feel my supporters have the right to know.  This is in NO WAY intended to make people feel like they need to give more.. in fact, quite the opposite. This is kind of a long read, but I have a lot of topics to cover. 

Ok, so I listed a goal of $3,000 per month.  Although, to be honest I don't actually need that much to go full time.  After all, I do make money from YouTube as well.   Exactly how much I need is hard to say.  I originally posted $3,000 because I knew without question that would be enough.  That would work out to $36,000 per year, combined with my YouTube earnings.   If I had the $3,000 today, I would quit work today and go full time.  No question. 

 Here's the thing, Patreon is a steady, stable income for the most part.  YouTube's adsense earnings can vary wildly from one month to the next.  For example, last year in 2015 I made as little as $400 one month and in December I made $4,000.   A lot of it just depends on how popular my channel is from one month to the next, what websites might have run a story on one of my videos, etc.  Even at $3,000 with Patreon, plus my YouTube earnings I'd still be taking a significant pay cut from what I earn now at my job in the I.T. field.  However, I realize that with the ability to produce more content that gap will close, possibly in less than a year. 

 So here's my plan... Over the last two years I have used my YouTube earnings to pay off all of our medical bills and credit card debt.  (I only started Patreon a few months ago)  So the only debt I have left is my house and two cars.  So my monthly budget is freed up quite a bit now, so in other words I can live on less money than before. I'm also trying to save up some money so that when I quit my Job I'll have some buffer to keep me going until I can increase my earnings from the additional content I'll be able to finally make.  (More regular content = more adsense money.)

So to make a long story short...  I will likely quit my I.T. job well before I reach the $3,000 goal.  In fact, $1,500 might even be enough.   So at the current rate of increase, I'm thinking this might happen sometime in the next 6 to 12 months.   However, in the meantime,  I don't feel right just pocketing all of the money from Patreon since that is donated.  It's different from AdSense revenue.  Or at least, it feels different.  

So I've had to change some of my thought patterns the last few months.  Usually I'm pretty stingy and I'll look at a product and think "Gee, I'd like to make a video about that, but I'm not going to spend $50 on that!"  Well, now, when I see something I want to make a video about I just buy it, because I feel like I should be using this money for something tangible.  In fact, I've been spending several hundred dollars per month on interesting hardware since i started Patreon.  Many of these items I haven't even shown or mentioned yet. (but you'll see them eventually)   I also think I've spent more on 8-Bit Keys than I have on 8-Bit Guy.  But that's mostly because I already have a huge backlog of videos to produce for 8-Bit Guy, but relatively little content for 8-Bit Keys.   In fact, I plan to start doing a lot more hardware projects showing off neat vintage hardware on both channels.   So the point is, even though your money isn't going towards the stated goal just yet, it is getting spent on the show.

I also plan on trying to get my website in a more functioning order, and then offer some of these items I no longer need up for sale.  That way it becomes less expensive to make a video about something if I can buy it, film it, and re-sell it.  It will still be at a loss, but not as much of a loss.  Not only that, but I only have so much room in the house.

And one more thing.. I have seen how a lot of other YouTubers make it a point to beg for money in each of their videos, or show a big reel of scrolling names for people that have donated.  I've decided that I don't want this campaign to be intrusive to my viewers.  So I'm just posting the link in the description field, and showing the little text about it in the end-credits.  I don't plan on ever mentioning Patreon in an actual video again (outside of the one I specifically made to jumpstart the campaign) True, I might get more contributions if I did, but I don't feel that is the right thing to do.

 OK, so I promised a sneak preview... This is an example of a piece of hardware I bought that I normally would have passed on.  The first half of the video is complete and I'll post a link here.  Feel free to watch it, or wait for the finished version, which will probably be this weekend.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUWodnJY3-s

And thank you for your support!