Michael Higgins: Canada's unimaginative media can't get enough of these academics - National Post

The CBC logo at the broadcaster's Toronto headquarters. Photo by Alex Urosevic/Postmedia/FileArticle contentEarlier this month, Canadian academic Michael Geist started his day by doing 14 radio interviews on “digital sovereignty” following Donald Trump’s decision to rename Lake Ontario.

Google had been accused of “digital imperialism” by showing users in the U.S. the name “Lake America” and in Canada Lake Ontario.

In a bid to understand the issue, news presenters reached out to Geist, an Ottawa University professor at the Centre for Law, Technology and Society and the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-Commerce Law.

“I woke up early on Monday morning for 14 interviews focused on digital sovereignty on CBC Radio stations across the country,” wrote Geist this month.

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And this isn’t the first time it has happened. In December, he again did 14 radio interviews after writing about the horrific Chanukah Massacre in Australia.

Geist is a media darling whose expertise is in huge demand. But he’s not the only one. Across the country there are a handful of academics who continually pop up in print, online and on TV and radio.

They’re the experts with insights the Canadian media loves.

Isaac Bogoch, a University of Toronto professor in the Department of Medicine and an infectious diseases specialist, became a household name and face during Covid. It seemed a day rarely passed without Bogoch being on TV.

But even now, whether it’s CP24 investigating how to prevent Group B strep in newborns, Global News looking at tick bites, or CTV News reporting on Ebola in the Congo, Bogoch is the guy to go to.

In Canada there is no shortage of politicians, but when it comes to academics talking about politics the spotlight tends to fall on a few.

Lori Turnbull, a political science professor and the director of the School of Public Administration at Dalhousie University, is one of the shining lights.