There’s a lot of buzz - most of it negative - coming out of the US at the moment about the country’s imminent analogue TV switchoff on February 17, 2009.

America is doing it the hard way - the whole country’s being switched off in one go - which has given rise to much talk about the potential for a large number of ‘digital refuseniks’.

Last fall, ABI Research reported that while 70% of viewers planned to attach a DTT set-top box to their TV set, and another 10% planned to switch to cable or satellite, 20% would just let their TV sets go dark.

The European DTT lobby group DigiTAG quotes US government estimates that approximately 15% of US households depend on the terrestrial platform for their primary television viewing, equivalent to around 17 million households - so that would suggest that over three million homes will refuse to make the switch.

And that in turn has led at least one commentator to predict that “February’s switch will have a devastating impact on the ratings of local TV stations and the broadcast networks.”

Could it happen in the UK?

Probably not - at least not because of people refusing to convert to digital. Digital UK’s quarterly tracker reports show that refuseniks - defined as those who say they will not convert any of their analogue TV sets to digital - declined from 3% to 1% between 2006 and 2008, although there were regional variations. And none of the early switchover experience in Borders, the first UK region to begin the switchover process, suggests anything like the US level of resistance.

However, as the UK progresses towards 100% digital TV penetration, the audience share of the main terrestrial networks is likely to continue falling anyway, as more households are introduced to multichannel choice and opt to expand their range of viewing outside the five terrestrial networks.

The Ofcom graph below illustrates what appears to be an inexorable trend. The yellow line (’Other’) represents the irresistible rise of the multichannel universe. Until switchover happens, that universe will continue to increase at the expense of the historical terrestrial channels.