A Day in the Life of the Modern Day Cartoon: The Future

The future can bring a bunch of things. HDTV, 3D TV, video on demand are all things that have came to give us content. All of these  had various degrees of success, but there are untapped markets. The other night, my TiVo box took a shit on me. A show needed to be reviewed, and I couldn’t wait for my box to miraculously start working. So, I go on to Cartoon Network’s site to see if the show is put up to view, and I see something fantastic. Cartoon Network has a live stream for their channel. The catch is that you need to log into the account for your TV provider.

Cartoon Network and Adult Swim have saved my ass numerous times because of where I was. All I have to do is log into my account, press the live TV link, and there I am. Dragons, Space Dandy, Steven Universe are all shows I’ve had to catch away from home, or when I am working on something else. Hell, most of the time, I have this up writing as I am watching the show on my other monitor. It is such a life saver, not to mention very convenient. So, this leads to a very odd question.

Why haven’t more channels taken this model? Or, at least take a model where you can pay a subscription to access it. I would love to do an a la carte channel service if I can pay for it. Roku allows it, but they don’t have enough to make me want to switch. With the models that networks have to take with providers like Time Warner or Optimum, you kind of have to fear what channels are going to get dropped. People have lost CBS, AMC, and even the Weather Channel  from various providers. Before this past season of the NFL started, Time Warner dropped CBS and it’s cable channels from it’s lineup due to a contract dispute. The only thing that brought the channels back was the fact that the NFL season was about to start. If that didn’t happen, many people were going to have to spend almost $330 on Sunday Ticket just to stream your favorite team. Networks and providers bicker like high school girls over money sometimes.

Back on point, this is an untapped avenue that needs to be explored. As far as I know, the only networks that do this are the Disney family of networks (including Disney, Disney XD, ESPN, and ABC), Cartoon Network, and Adult Swim. A lot of networks have episodes on their site, as well. It just seems the grandparents in the CEO chair, like Rupert Murdoch, just want to stand on the sidelines, and screw a large demographic of people. There are a lot of people who use 2 or more screens on their home computers (or if they’re slick, at work). The art of the multitask is hitting its stride, and the network heads need to come up to speed and come up to 2014.