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Enlarge CBS Smith: The canceled crime series, starring Shohreh Aghdashloo and Ray Liotta, will play out at CBS' Innertube.Viewers can see the four episodes that never aired and hear producers explain where the series was headed. NETWORKS ON THE NET TV goes online: Networks hit the Net to maintain audiences, expand options A wide Web: There are plenty of options for online viewing What's playing: Find out which shows are online

This fall, episodes of many series, including the biggest hits and newest shows, are available online for free as networks try to hold on to audiences while finding new business in new technologies.

"We need to think of ourselves not just as a broadcast network, but a network or platform where ABC connects its viewers to its shows across any technology. It could be through online, cellphone, portable media player or television," says Albert Cheng, who oversees digital media for Disney-ABC Television Group.

The current efforts are largely experimental, although many have found strong advertiser interest. Since last year, viewers have been able to pay to download and own commercial-free episodes of such shows as NBC's The Office via iTunes and other websites.

Last spring, ABC began streaming video episodes of such hits as Desperate Housewives and Lost on abc.com. The price: ads that can't be fast-forwarded through and a varying shelf life of availability.

To stimulate interest, networks have posted new and returning shows before their TV premieres, such as CBS' The Class or CW's Veronica Mars. The OC premieres Thursday, but viewers can see it now on Fox's MySpace.com site.

In most cases, episodes are streamed starting the day after broadcast to give fans a chance to catch up on missed episodes and to attract new viewers. In a reverse twist, CBS' Innertube site will air all seven episodes of canceled serial Smith and have the producers explain where the story was headed.

Many of the innovations are of the trial-and-error sort, but Jeffrey Cole, director of the University of Southern California's Center for the Digital Future, says TV may avoid falling behind as the music and movie worlds did.

TV is "trying anything and everything. They want to see what sticks. They want to be ahead of the curve," he says.

Online viewing, while still in its infancy, is growing dramatically. ABC recorded 5.7 million streaming requests in the spring and 7.2 million from Sept. 22 to Oct. 16.

NBC, which streams episodes of six new series on NBC Rewind, went from 2 million streams in the first week of the fall season to 4 million in the fourth. (In comparison, more than 20 million people tune into CSI each week on their televisions.)

Viewers watched NBC's shows for an average of more than 22 minutes during the week of Oct. 14, helping nbc.com to the top spot in time spent visiting (11.3 minutes) and total visits among broadcast network websites. ABC's streaming site was one of the four fastest-growing U.S. websites in September, according to Hitwise, which monitors online usage.

"The ultimate goal is to see if we can add new viewers to the on-air (broadcasts) because clearly, that's where the bigger payoff is," says NBC's Jeff Gaspin.

And CBS spokesman Chris Ender says early results indicate the streaming episodes are helping broadcast viewership. "There's no evidence that it has hurt yet. We see it as being very additive," he says.

Jupiter Research analyst Todd Chanko expects computer viewing to grow, but only so much; it can't replace a TV's bigger picture and the chance to lean back and relax on the couch. "A PC is not designed for the viewing of television."