As a guy that does YouTube: they are painfully unaware of how rigged that game is. Every week I post 5-7 videos that get on average 1.3K views each, but my “valid watch hours” to get monetized never moves despite my number of views and subs constantly increasing. It’s a rigged game anyone playing it knows it. Even if I DID break through, I doubt I’d make more than $20 below the million sub mark. That’s why I set up a locals, buymeacoffee, suvscribestar, AND refer people to #nostr. Still not a lot of money, but at least it gives people a way to pay me if they feel like it. If your students are banking on THIS set up, then they are delusional. I at least have a real job at the same time. I recommend they do the same.