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​World's Richest YouTuber Dan Middleton Makes Cool £12 Million Playing Video Games

​World's Richest YouTuber Dan Middleton Makes Cool £12 Million Playing Video Games

Lucky bastard. The former student initially started out filming himself playing Pokemon, but now he mainly focuses on Minecraft.

Jess Hardiman

Jess Hardiman

Next time someone slags you off for lying in your pants while gaming, just give them the latest spiel about Dan Middleton. Known as DanTDM to his millions of fans, he has just been crowned the richest YouTuber in the world this year after making £12.3 million ($16.6 million).

The former Tesco worker from Aldershot has managed to rack up the serious wonga by simply filming himself playing video games online - and Forbes has now dubbed him the world's richest YouTuber. Not a bad accolade to have, although it'll probably make some of you wonder why the hell you're not a multi-millionaire given the amount of hours you've spent in front of the screen.

As well as uploading footage of computer games he's playing and describing what he's doing, the 26-year-old also tips off viewers on how they can reach higher levels of the game.

'It's something I was just not prepared for at all," he said, according to the Daily Mail. "It's something I've slowly been learning about in the past three or four years. In the past five years YouTube has evolved. Being a YouTuber was not a thing before.

"I know people that make similar content to me who are 30 or 40 years old so I don't think there is an age limit to it at all."

The former Northampton University student initially started out filming himself playing Pokemon during his studies, but now he mainly focuses on Minecraft, the classic animated computer game that involves players building a world out of blocks.

He even holds the Guinness World Record for 'most views for a dedicated Minecraft video channel' - because, yep, such a thing exists (remember, there's a Guinness World Record for pretty much anything).

Now being watched by more than 16 million people, he makes money from advertising with YouTube giving him about 68 percent of the advertising profits to him.

His missus is also into gaming, and plays Minecraft. The pair married in 2013, and apparently spend a lot of time gaming together.

Despite the fact that some viewers are middle-aged, his channel was originally set up for kids aged between five and 10.

He once came under criticism for uploading a video of himself using a blowtorch to burn a children's toy, with London Fire Brigade even asking him to remove the video from YouTube. But he didn't and it remains on his page.

Not only is he doing something for a living that the rest of us would give our left arm for, he's also getting actually stonking rich off the back of it. £12.3 million? Yeah, please.

Featured Image Credit: YouTube / DanTDM

Topics: Forbes, GAMING, UK News, News