How did I become a YouTube Partner?

This morning I realised that its been a full two years since I started keeping some stats from my YouTube account, this is where every day at about 7am I take a note of the total Video Views, Channel Views and Subscribers.
In Feb 2008 I got an email from Youtube asking me if I wanted to become a Partner, one of the first in the UK, I ignored them at first as I did not have a clue what they were talking about and to be honest I thought it was some kind of spam or junk mail.
After a few more emails from them I Googled "YouTube Partner" read as many results as I could and thought I'd give it a try, I got accepted at the start of March 2008 which is when I started keeping totals of certain things upon the advice of Partners in America.
So I guess your wondering was it worth it, yes it was, because I think I would have given up making Airsoft videos by now had it not been for making partnership.
The Partner program paid for my cameras, laptops, hard drives etc.
My GF would not have been happy about me spending so much on equipment, but since YT was now paying for it she was not that bothered and put up with my interest as I was no longer cleaning out my bank account or maxing credit cards

So on the 3rd March 2008 I started keeping these totals.

21.55 3rd March 2008
Video Views: 523,687
Channel Views: 21,802
Subscribers: 541

Two years later the totals are as follows

07.13am 3rd March 2010
Video Views: 29,827,649
Channel Views: 2,660,353
Subscribers: 75,382

With the channel and subscriber totals Youtube displays the correct total on my channel page, but with the total video views the figure on my channel page is always about 250,000 short each day, I dont know why.
John