Cartoon Network Aims at Devices With Its ‘Micro-Network’ Launch

Cartoon Network will release an app later this year that will deliver original 15-second content bites — videos, games, polls, and trivia — solely to mobile devices, the company said Friday.

Cartoon Network Anything, which the company calls a “micro-network,” aims to tackle the brand-new technology question of how to deliver device-specific content. As more and more of our television watching, game playing, news reading and attention turns to mobile devices, media companies are discovering that we use phones and tablets in very different ways. For example, tablets stay at home and more often act as a second or third television set than as a device for consuming content on the go.

Some 80 percent of tablet usage happens at home, according to Adobe, and Motorola reported last year that more people watch shows and movies on tablets in the bedroom than they do on a television set. For that kind of usage, full episodes are crucial, and apps like Netflix’s, along with network TV apps and the existing Watch Cartoon Network app, deliver what is essentially a replica of television.

Phones are a different story. People do watch video on their phones, but in shorter bursts, and generally while they’re in transit or have a few minutes to spare. The attention span for users of those devices is short, and the marketplace keeps driving it down: Vine would have us believe that our attention span is a mere six seconds.

Enter the “micro-network.” Chris Waldron, Cartoon Network Digital’s vice president, said Cartoon Network Anything is an attempt to “boil down Cartoon Network to its essence, to the smallest device.” The always-connected app will be free and will not require cable authorization, unlike the current Watch Cartoon Network apps.

It will deliver constantly updating 15-second original content, and users will be able to swipe forward to find new pieces. Mr. Waldron said the content will be a mix of interactive and video content, games, and potentially even new animations or shorts. You can “like” the content as you watch, and Cartoon Network will be watching to see which are the most successful.

“What does a television network look like on a new device?” Mr. Waldron said. “The micro-network is designed for the phone. This is a four-inch device concept.”

Mr. Waldron said the network, like almost every other, has watched mobile consumption grow dramatically in the past few years, and even outpace the Cartoon Network website. He said that Cartoon Network Anything is an attempt to create an entirely new product with content designed for the medium, rather than repurposing television for mobile viewing.

That’s a bold goal, and one that is appropriate for the modern age of media consumption. It takes advantage of something that has been frustrating me for years: Most content on mobile devices is basically just television made smaller, with 30-second ads attached. That’s missing the point of what’s possible with digital media. It’s infinitely malleable and portable, and it doesn’t have to be a one-way medium.

And creating phone-specific content is a safe way to experiment with mobile viewing. Television networks are slow to adopt mobile and digital distribution for a variety of reasons, foremost among them that it angers cable and satellite operators, who worry that they’ll lose subscribers to mobile apps. The same is true for the local TV affiliates of the major networks, where digital distribution takes away both viewers and the ability to make money on syndicated reruns.

An experiment like Cartoon Network Anything bridges the gap a bit by investing in new content made specifically for phones. If it’s successful, it could carve a path for new media (and ad) models that take advantage of the unique properties of digital content: It can be whatever and wherever you want it to be.