Hi everyone! I could use some advice on how to come to a fair resolution for my kids and their youtube channel. How everything has played out is complicated, so I'll explain.
DS12 created a youtube channel for himself in 2016. He created pokemon videos just for fun and had a few subscribers. He received a capture card for his birthday in late 2017, and started making video game videos. One of the first ones he made became very popular at one point and continues to be.
DS15 had his own channel as well, but didn't do a lot with it. He started making the video game videos as well, for DS12's channel, and the boys were working together well. Many of the videos the boys did together.
Into the spring 2018 the channel starts receiving a lot of subscribers and a lot of views on their videos. DS15 is contributing more now, the boys agree that they will share the channel. DS15 starts doing live streams of video game play on it.
Over the summer, DS12 starts to get edged out a bit. DS 15 kind of takes ownership of it with the live streaming. The boys have put in to monetize the channel months ago, but the process is long. DS 15 takes the channel over and DS12 agrees to it and starts up a new channel. I tried to let the boys come to an agreement on their own without DS12 getting the short end of the stick. I told them when the monetization came through, they would have to share the profits 50/50.
The channel has been now earning $ for three months, and the amount coming in is more than we all thought. About $275 a month, which is a lot to them. DS15 is now being surly about giving DS12 his 50%. His arguments are that the channel gained popularity when he took it over and he's has been making videos for the channel on his own.
I just checked, and right now 89% of the channels revenue comes from the popular video DS12 made. I'd like to get this resolved and put in writing so their will be no more discussion or conflict about it. I still think the boys should share the profit 50/50, and probably should do that for the life of the channel, since that is what we all initially agreed to.
Right now the $ is being put into an account that belongs to DS15. We have not yet asked him to pull any $ out to give to DS12.
Can anyone give some insight on a more fair way to do this? I don't want this to be a problem when DS15 leaves our home, and is harder to force him to share the $. Should we set up a joint paypal and is that even possible? We also have to decide a way to fairly set aside $ to pay the taxes.
Thanks for any direction with this, I did not see a lot of this coming, or I would have handled it differently and told DS15 to stay with his own channel.