YouTube amateur kids and youngs are making substantial money thanks to the ad-share revenue program. For example, someone like Odell, with 125,000 subscribers and two million views a month, according to The New York Times.

The NYT explains in an extended article how the next YouTube stars are cashing out. Some of them have received a prize of four days of tips and training in New York, along with a $35,000 check. 

Names that mean nothing to people are successful YouTubers. People like Ray William Johnson, Mystery Guitar Man, Smosh, Michelle Phan, the ShayTards, Jenne Marbles, Freddie Wong, What the Buck or Philip DeFranco get millions of views and many them earn six figures from their videos.