Jim Samples.

Predicting the Future
All the innovation at CartoonNetwork.com isn't just for the sake of forwarding the cause of online animation and entertainment, of course. Growth and profitability are the end goals. "We are expected to generate sufficient revenue to more than cover the expenses that we're incurring in building out the site," Samples points out. "It is an investment in a business, but the business is being managed as a part of the overall Cartoon Network business. I think that is one of our key advantages."

Page views, unique visitors and sticky content are the traditional measuring sticks for online entertainment sites, but recent events in the industry have cast doubt on this practice.

Register observes, "Visitors and page views don't seem to equal dollars like everyone thought they would. [...] None of this equals dollars. It's all great, it's all experimental, it's all very cool, but targeting people and audiences and all that, it doesn't matter. We've all found out that none of this equals dollars today. It may equal dollars later on, so we need to just keep plugging away and figuring out what seems to work and what doesn't and hopefully all entertainment Websites will become profitable someday. I'm in the same fix as everyone else."

The rewards of the future are where CartoonNetwork.com has set its sights. While today it strives to maintain the freshest content of the moment, behind the scenes the site is looking forward. If all goes as planned, CartoonNetwork.com will render itself obsolete.

With such hit characters as the Powerpuff Girls driving traffic to CartoonNetwork.com, the online division has the opportunity to highlight cartoon superstars and library classics alike.

Global growth is one piece to the puzzle. Manifestations of CartoonNetwork.com are already available in 13 sites internationally in numerous languages. As the network and technology expand worldwide, the range of Cartoon Network Online will grow in tandem.

New technology should play into CartoonNetwork.com's plans as the television and online worlds converge into a single vehicle. Development on products for the next wave of interactive animation for products like Replay and Tevo has already commenced, with an eye toward enhanced TV boxes and concurrent Web-television devices.

"Down the road, between five and ten years, I think there is no Cartoon Network Online," muses Samples. "I hope we get to a situation were you sit down on your couch, you flip on your flat screen TV that's hanging on the wall in front of you, you flip to the Cartoon Network channel and you have an option of watching the linear network, a very sit-back experience, or you take your remote and flip over to the games section, or chat with your friends using AOL Instant Messenger while on the Cartoon Network Channel talking about your favorite Dragonball Z episodes."

With the backing of powerhouse AOL Time Warner, that scenario has become more plausible. As Cartoon Network continues to develop its online products under a unified network-wide banner, it stands as an example of how to use online and on-air units effectively in harmony, something that shouldn't go unnoticed by its new parent company.

Brett Rogers is a freelance writer and law student based in Baltimore.