Musician Scott Andrew posted a theory that basically says if you can build 5000 hardcore fans that will spend just $20 a year each on your stuff, you will bring in $100,000 and can quit your day job:
Now, 5000 is a big number, but not that big. That's like, what, one-eighth of an average baseball stadium? And you might not even need that many. Here's an exercise: take your own salary, pre-taxes, and divide it by 20. If you were to quit your job right now and start living as a full-time musician, poet or author, that's how many fans you'd need, spending $20 each year to support your art. So, if you're making $30K yearly, you'd need 1500 paying fans each year to replace your salary. And it gets better if you're willing to take a pay cut. In Washington state, where I live, a person working for minimum wage would only need around 700 paying fans. As Hobbit sez, there are a lot of people working for minimum wage doing stuff they hate.
Of course, as the commenters on his site pointed out, if you have a band, you have to divide that between the number of members, and it doesn't take expenses into consideration, but it still seems like an attainable goal.
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