Later this year, another special campaign called "Toonami: Lockdown" hopes to continue to push the convergence envelope.

The three remaining "Total Immersion Cartoon" events are "The Big Pick II," which will allow viewers to interact with the television by choosing a new Cartoon Cartoon series for the fall of 2002 from 11 new shorts; "Toonami: Lockdown," featuring an online multi-player game where viewers can team up, use codes retrieved from the television and help save Tom; and "Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?," highlighted by on-air clues that viewers can use to unlock secret Scooby-Doo related content online, such as games, icons and sounds. Each event will serve as a laboratory for new methods of letting viewers to use their computers to take part in the action on-air.

"There are a lot of different ways to do the enhancements. It's an ongoing process. The ones that do well we continue using. The ones that didn't do well, we either revise them or scrap them," Register says.

In Orbit
Although CartoonNetwork.com can make wider use of Cartoon Network's gargantuan library of characters than the television network, all the games, character pages, "Web Premiere Toons" and other content online can't make use of it all. So how do you effectively draw on all the characters in the combined libraries of four prolific animation studios? Turn them into online trading cards.

Cartoon Orbit has been a huge hit with kids.

"Kids love to collect and love to trade," Samples observes. "Those are just basic play habits that have been around forever. This is a way to allow kids to have that sort of play online. Pokémon is a great example of how powerful that is."

Last October, CartoonNetwork.com launched "Cartoon Orbit," a community for kids to collect and trade cToons, the site's online trading cards. Orbit members can display their cToon collections in cZones, or individual sites they create and customize.

Over 650,000 users have joined Orbit since its launch, with an average of 20,000 more joining each week. Meshing nicely with its Web-television convergence campaign, codes appear every Friday night on Cartoon Network during Cartoon Cartoon Fridays that viewers can use to retrieve a limited edition cToon online. "The Powerpuff Popularity Contest" also featured secret codes viewers redeemed online for cToons of Buttercup, Blossom and Bubbles.

Two-way interaction already exists between users and CartoonNetwork.com, but Cartoon Orbit introduces a new aspect of interaction between users. Because the experience is menu-driven, Orbit is safe, easy to use and expandable internationally across language barriers and other technology platforms, strategies that are still in development.

"There are key connection points between online and on-air. The network has a hard time using all the characters in its library because it's in a linear environment. We can use the whole library," Register explains.

The Cartoon Orbit has provided an appealing outlet for marketers, as well. The new Kellogg's Powerpuff Girls Cereal contains a secret code that sends kids to EetAndErn.com, a heavily promoted Kellogg's Website where kids earn points toward prizes, view additional Powerpuff Girls content and retrieve limited edition cToons. With the simultaneous appearance of Kellogg's and Milk as online and on-air Cartoon Network sponsors, kids could theoretically eat an all-Powerpuff Girls breakfast. Samples admits, however, that the meal marketing monopoly is just a happy coincidence

Keeping the Big Kids Happy
CartoonNetwork.com's user breakdown indicates that about one-third of the audience is adults, one-third is teens and one-third is under 11, demographics that skew a bit older than the on-air network. According to Samples, Toonami, a block of mostly action-adventure anime, tends to attract the most teens and young 20s males. In an effort to appeal to that audience and demonstrate the full potential of interactive entertainment, CartoonNetwork.com introduced "Toonami Reactor" in late March 2001.

"Reactor" is a 12-week exhibition of enhanced Toonami programming online consisting of streaming Dragonball Z and Star Blazers episodes with synched commentary, games, content and trivia. The innovative split-screen format works well to allow viewers to move seamlessly between episodes and interactive content. The experience is best with a broadband connection, but a 56K modem is adequate to view most features and watch medium-quality streaming video without a problem. As larger monitors and higher connection speeds become more prevalent, it's easy to see why CartoonNetwork.com thinks it will be at the forefront of television and online mixed media. Fans of the Dragonball Z introductory segment now absent from Toonami will be happy to find that it's present on "Toonami Reactor."

The fan-friendly features are by design, according to Samples. "In developing [Reactor] we've had active, ongoing conversations with the anime clubs at universities and with the bulletin boards and fan clubs to develop what [the content] should look like. It's been a lot of fun to do it this way."

Reactor is scheduled to feature 40 episodes of Dragonball Z's Frieza Saga, 26 episodes of Star Blazers, two new Dragonball Z games and two new Toonami-specific games.