The British blogger Eliot Higgins, who has played an important role in tracing the flow of arms to Syrian rebels through close analysis of video clips posted on YouTube from his living room in England, began an appeal for financial support from readers this week.

In a statement explaining his campaign on the crowdfunding Web site Indiegogo, Mr. Higgins explained that he hoped “to turn the Brown Moses Blog from a part-time hobby to a full-time job.” Late last month, Mr. Higgins had informed his readers that he might have to stop blogging about Syria if he accepted a full-time job.

I’m about to accept a job that precludes me from blogging about Syria, and probably tweeting that much about it either. — Brown Moses (@Brown_Moses) 29 Mar 13

I’d like to blog forever, but I’d also like to pay my mortgage, so that looks like it unless I win tonight’s lottery. — Brown Moses (@Brown_Moses) 29 Mar 13

Instead of accepting the position, Mr. Higgins told The Lede in a recent Skype interview, he has decided to seek support from readers. Although he remains acutely aware of the need to support his family, Mr. Higgins said, “I feel like it’s almost a duty to keep doing it now — if I stop doing it, there’s not going to be anyone to take up the slack.”

Mr. Higgins, who told The Lede that he had no professional experience in journalism and had been working for the previous decade “in various administration and financial roles,” has recently welcomed a series of reporters to his work space, a table in his living room. There, surrounded by his daughter’s toys, he sits down in spare moments to scour video clips on 500 YouTube channels for clues about what sort of weapons are being used in Syria.

As Matt Weaver, The Guardian’s Middle East live-blogger, reported:

Higgins initially operated on chatrooms and comment threads under the pseudonym Brown Moses. His online avatar – taken from one of Francis Bacon’s paintings of a screaming pope – was often the first to appear in the comments section on the Guardian’s daily Middle East live blog. Each day he would do verbal battle below the line with online trolls, conspiracy theorists and fellow Arab spring obsessives. The name Brown Moses, taken from a Frank Zappa song, has led to confusion about his identity.

In a long interview with NOS, the Dutch state broadcaster, Mr. Higgins explained how his curiosity about what was happening in Syria led him to explore the available video evidence for himself.

The blogger’s description of his work on the crowdfunding site is accompanied by a video statement and testimonials from a roster of reporters and rights workers who have found the blog to be an invaluable source of information and analysis.

Among the journalists who have used video unearthed by Mr. Higgins is my colleague C. J. Chivers, who cited the Brown Moses blog when he reported in February that “Saudi Arabia has financed a large purchase of infantry weapons from Croatia and quietly funneled them to antigovernment fighters in Syria in a drive to break the bloody stalemate.”

That report, following up on the blogger’s work, was accompanied by a post on The Times’s At War blog from Mr. Higgins, in which he observed: “The use of social media by opposition groups and activists in Syria has allowed those of us who follow these sources carefully to pursue a different form of insight into conflict reporting than had been possible before the time when opposition fighters reflexively videotaped their operations and posted them online.”