You'll never survive off of ad revenue

If you get 400,000 hits for content you put on YouTube, you're likely to earn $25 in ad revenue.

Patreon was set up to help pay content creators for creating content by becoming a patron of their art. The idea is that you pledge some money, let's say a dollar per video that the creator makes. If the creator gets enough patrons, they can earn thousands of dollars per 'thing' that they make.

Jack Conte of Pomplamoose has 1264 patrons supporting him. Every time he publishes a video, he will earn $5005.

Here he explains the whole story leading up to the creation of Patreon.