She's strengthening her personal brand and potentially gaining access to new clients for future work. I have absolutely no problem with her asking for donations, but let's not be disingenuous :)
This is the first time I've seen "do it for the exposure" in the wild (http://theoatmeal.com/comics/exposure). And you even called the other person disingenuous (albeit in jest). I'm impressed.
As I understand it, she was taking unpaid leave from her day-job at Vice Motherboard (despite then producing full-length articles for Motherboard on the topic).