CitrusTV


CitrusTV is the completely student-run television studio of Syracuse University and SUNY ESF in Syracuse, New York. It was founded in 1970 and has more than 350 student members.
The organization is not a station, network or channel and does not broadcast its own programming, except for online streaming. Instead, CitrusTV provides programming, both live and taped—primarily to its website, YouTube, and the Orange Television Network, which is the university-controlled cable network available in all campus buildings on channel 24.2.

History

Synapse era (1970–1977)

The organization was founded in 1970 as the Syracuse University Union student-run video program through its kickoff event "Alternatives in Communications Media" featuring a lecture by Marshall McLuhan, a concert by the Jefferson Airplane, and its main event, the "Multimedia Phenomenon" in Manley Field House.
In 1972, University Union was granted the former Watson Dormitory dining hall as an interim UU center, with funding to construct a theater, the Community Darkrooms, and the first color television studio on the SU campus, edit rooms, and offices to teach and promote portable video production. Students designed and built the cable television system connecting large TV monitors in most campus buildings. They named the program Synapse, and soon began looking for funds to sustain the students, many of whom were now graduating. They secured a grant from the New York State Council on the Arts to run the Artist Visitation Program where students could work with video artists from around the state exploring the nascent use of video technology as a formal art medium.
By the mid-1970s, the Synapse Artist Visitation Program expanded into the new Newhouse Communication Center, working at night and mostly on the 2" video tape machines editing artistic works shot on small format recorders.
In 1977, Synapse ended its use of the Watson studio and formalized its association with the Newhouse School continuing its NYSCA post-production program following a National Endowment for the Arts grant to control 2" video editing by computer. Watson studio and the cable television system were now run again only by students as UUTV.
UUTV and Synapse were conceived as a center for experimental video productions using the "portable" video equipment that was just becoming available in the early 1970s. By current standards, the "portable" equipment would be considered ludicrously heavy and bulky, and barely portable at all.
During these years there was a continuing debate between those who favored more conventional approaches to programming and those who envisioned more experimental and creative approaches. In 1971, cables were run across the campus to various locations where students could watch the programming, including dormitory lounges, the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, and the basement of the E.S. Bird Library. At its peak, the system had over 100 monitors able to receive the programming.
Early founding members included Carl Geiger and Bill Viola, who helped build the cable system. In 1972, Synapse began operating in Watson Hall. A color three-camera television studio was built. Visiting artists who recorded material at the studio included members of The Firesign Theatre. Operations were managed by Gail Waldron, Bob Burns and Lance Wisniewski. Synapse recorded music concerts and prominent speakers on campus. Synapse had a portable system which was used to record the feelings of inmates at Attica Prison following the Attica prison riot.
In 1973, Henry Baker organized remote coverage for Richard Nixon's second inauguration and the demonstrations in Washington. In 1974, wishing to expand its offerings, Synapse sought and received outside support from the New York State Council on the Arts. Artists in a visiting artists program visited Synapse and used the facilities for the production of video art pieces for several more years.
Other projects included Carl Geiger designing and building new electronic image making tools and producing an elaborate experiment called “Multi-Origination Dance Piece." Synapse maintained master edits and a tape collection with copies of works produced through the programs. They actively encouraged wide distribution of the produced work, especially broadcast.
In 1977, Synapse left Watson Theatre, leaving behind the color production studio and campus cable system. Synapse forged an association with the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, with which it shared its production equipment and studio facilities, and continued one of its functions as an independent production house for experimental video, allowing access to the community and to video artists, as well as producing some of its own productions.
In 1981, SU had become dissatisfied with the curricular component of their relationship with Synapse. While executive director Henry Baker made a proposal that redefined the educational aspects of the Synapse Program, SU rejected the plan and elected to terminate the program. Synapse moved off campus and closed in November 1981.

UUTV era (1977–2004)

The color production studio and campus cable system were taken over by the largest student-run organization on campus, University Union, which also programmed film screenings, concerts, speakers, and later established a radio station, WERW. The television station was reorganized as University Union Television, or UUTV. Though technically under the control of University Union, the station had its own management, which reported to those in charge of University Union as a separate "board." Despite this oversight, the station usually ran autonomously. There was also a faculty advisor nominally responsible for oversight.
The station remained entirely run by students, who programmed the station and produced television programming in-house, including a nightly half-hour news program. UUTV also occasionally aired X-Rated films in the early 80s, largely to generate publicity. Early student productions included "Newswatch,", a comedy show which had a format almost identical to that of Comedy Central's "The Daily Show," which did not come on the air until the 1990s, though "Newswatch" was frankly derivative of the "Weekend Update" segment of "Saturday Night Live," which premiered in 1975. Several of the shows including Newswatch 'bicycled' their tapes over to Syracuse Cable TV, and had them aired on the cable TV system's Public-access television channel.
Another long-running show was "Null & Void," a sketch comedy show that ran almost 20 years, starting in January 1987; its premise of the programming at a fictional low-rent TV station was strongly influenced by SCTV. Another popular show during the years 1990-1992 was "Uncle Bobo's World of Fun" which included such colorful characters as Texas Bob Stone and Marty the Fishboy.
The station also continually broadcast a sports-talk show, and each semester ran "The Bio Answer Show," in which University biology professor Marvin Druger would broadcast the answers to that evening's biology exam, so that the large number of students taking the class would not have to wait several days to find out how they did on the test. "The Rhythm," a popular music video program created by undergrad Dawn Jordan featuring music and interviews from R&B, Rap, Reggae and Urban Contemporary artists, was another popular show during this era and added diversity to both the station's programming and the channel's production staff.
The station also programmed professionally produced television shows from television's past, such as "The Twilight Zone" and "Star Trek." Some of these were 16 millimeter films shown on the station's film chain. Though the films were rented from a local film library, the legality of showing them over the campus cable system was never clear. Many eyebrows were raised when UUTV showed several recent theatrical releases even before HBO had screened them, including "Raiders of the Lost Ark." During this period, the station was on the air approximately seven hours per day, seven days per week.
In 1989, an organization called "U-Net," an association of college-based broadcasters, began showing some of UUTV's productions at various colleges around the nation, including "Null and Void." This led to a clip of "Null and Void" appearing on the national show "Entertainment Tonight."
During the early 90s, UUTV established a relationship with the Syracuse cable TV franchise that enabled nearly all UUTV programs to be aired on the City of Syracuse's cable system public-access channel. During this time, the public-access channel was happy to accept and air the UUTV programming as long as it complied with some rudimentary decency standards. There were a few shows that could not clear the decency hurdle, but for the most part, all of the UUTV programming eventually found its way on to public-access.
The nightly newscast and the once-a-week morning show both did this, along with most of the station's entertainment and sports programs. Campus 7 News was aired at 10 p.m. on the public-access channel, leading the show to be tagged by its producers as "Central New York's Only Prime-Time Newscast," which it was.
The arrangement with Syracuse's public-access channel quickly became the only remaining practical outlet to distribute UUTV programming. During this time, the campus' original closed-circuit TV network was generally not maintained by the university at even the most basic level. As all of the campus dorm rooms were re-wired for commercial cable TV, the campus closed-circuit TV network was pushed out of the dorm rooms and relegated to the "dorm lounge areas." It became logistically difficult for students to view the campus network. As TVs quickly became a standard fixture in every dorm room, students rarely watched TV in the dorm lounge areas, and the campus closed-circuit network faded into obscurity.
The demise of the campus' closed-circuit TV network did not dampen the enthusiasm of the students at UUTV. The organization continued to attract record numbers of students and regularly produced a full complement of news, sports and entertainment programs every semester. During this time, SU exercised almost zero oversight over the station, which empowered students to experiment, learn, have fun, and create any type of show their hearts desired. With the absence of university oversight, and no ratings to fret about, UUTV became a fertile ground for experimentation and learning. In some nominal sense, UUTV had returned to its Synapse roots.
Over the years, there was sporadic controversy about the station's funding. Some student government members thought that the student fee should not be funding educational opportunities for those students working at the station, and that UUTV's film programming was wasteful and duplicative of the UU Film Board's programming. Several times, the station was given a budget allocation of $0 during the annual student government budget hearings, yet with help from the larger UU organization, was always able to bounce back.
In 1999, UUTV's great grandparent, Light Works Community Darkrooms, re-entered UUTV's life in a most unexpected manner. SU announced that they had accepted a very substantial grant, which would further develop the photography program of Light Works Community Darkrooms. Unfortunately, Light Works was physically located directly next to the UUTV studios in the Watston Theater complex. Light Works was hungry to acquire the UUTV real estate for their upcoming expansion, and their newfound grant money provided the political and monetary support that they needed. SU administration was eager to accept the Light Works grant, and only nominally aware of UUTV's activities. Consequently, the original Watson Theater television studio was completely gutted to make room for the Light Works expansion. The UUTV studios and offices were moved down the hall and squeezed into a space that formerly housed the original UUTV offices and the independent student radio station, WJPZ. The Watson Theater complex was renamed the Robert B. Menschel Media Center, in recognition of the Light Works donor.
Though the UUTV studio and office spaces were now significantly smaller, the station did benefit from a new complement of production equipment that was purchased as part of the relocation. In effect, SU administration had forced UUTV to accept an implicit deal that traded real-estate for new equipment.
In the early 21st century, Internet distribution of UUTV programming became technologically practical, and the station found a new outlet to distribute their programming.