Turkish Radio and TV Broadcasting Corporation’s new streaming application and the continuity of music policy as an educational institution

Abstract

While numerous studies focus on streaming platforms as new business models or as novel elements in the supply chain, there is a notable gap in research addressing how streaming is operationalized within the context of state cultural policies. This study aims to fill this gap by conducting a preliminary examination of Turkish Radio and Television Broadcasting Corporation’s (TRT’s) digital transformation through its music streaming platform, TRT Listen. This research contributes to the international literature by highlighting various potential approaches to the digitalization of public radio broadcasting. This study, which examines the purpose and realization of TRT Listen, first provides a historical overview of TRT’s radio broadcasting and thus reveals the continuity in TRT’s cultural policy, which is shaped as a mission to educate the public and inculcate a national cultural identity, from radio broadcasting to the platform app. Two different research methods were used in this study: walk-through technique for the app and in-depth interviews with TRT’s staff and music industry representatives. The basic argument suggests that TRT Listen represents a continuation of historical music policies and nation state cultural agenda inherited from TRT’s radio era. However, at the operational level, this strategic continuity seems to disappear in the audience engagement techniques of digital platforms. The three main discussion sections of this article – TRT Listen’s strategic orientation, content curation and copyright management – reveal the platform’s mission to educate the public culturally in Turkey.