louisck.net

In a question-and-answer session with the online community Reddit, the comedian Louis C. K. fantasized about the possibility of making “eight million bucks” through sales of an Internet-only comedy special, money that could then be applied to other projects like making a feature film or amassing a collection of really nice camera lenses.

Though he hasn’t hit such lofty figures yet for his comedy special, “Louis C. K.: Live at the Beacon Theater,” which is currently for sale only through his Web site, he said he had already turned a profit on the project.

In a post published Tuesday night on louisck.net, the comedian said that he had sold more than 110,000 copies of the special, which was made available Saturday for $5, with more than 50,000 of those sales coming in the first 12 hours after it was offered. (The $5 fee buys two downloads and two streams of the performance, which was filmed during the New York Comedy Festival in November.)

From his gross sales of over $500,000, Louis C. K. said he subtracted about $170,000 for the production costs of the special, which he directed, and about $32,000 for the development of his Web site, as well “some money for PayPal charges etc,” to arrive at a profit of about $200,000. (Or, “after taxes $75.58,” he joked.)

What seemed to satisfy him most, Louis C. K. wrote, was that “we can safely say that the experiment really worked.” He added: “If anybody stole it, it wasn’t many of you. Pretty much everybody bought it.”

That, he said, was sufficiently encouraging that when he sells concert tickets or other works in the future, he will do it on his Web site “and I’ll continue to follow the model of keeping my price as far down as possible, not overmarketing to you, keeping as few people between you and me as possible in the transaction.”

Then again, Louis C. K. added: “Of course I reserve the right to go back on all of this and sign a massive deal with a company that pays me fat coin.”

Given his penchant for creative vulgarity, we’ve quoted as much of that statement as we can.