VANCOUVER - For most Canadian TV viewers, Feb. 17, 2009, will pass like any other day.
But for those living near the U.S. border who like to snag their television signals over the air from nearby American stations, it could be the day their TVs go dark at midnight.
It's the day U.S. broadcasters officially convert to digital transmission and shut down their old-fashioned analogue transmitters for good.
Canadians with satellite TV or cable services won't notice the changeover. Nor will anyone owning one of the newer televisions being sold with digital tuners.
The switch to the higher-quality digital signal has been in the works since the mid-1990s. Digital transmission opened the door to high-definition pictures by being able to cram more picture and audio information into the signal.
Broadcasters have been simultaneously sending analogue and digital signals for some time.
The U.S. government is spending US$1.5 billion to subsidize the transition by offering households two $40 coupons towards the purchase of converter boxes worth roughly $60 each that would allow analogue TVs to receive digital signals.
Still, some observers fear many Americans will be caught by surprise next Feb. 17, despite an awareness campaign that began ramping up this year.
The Nielsen Co., the famed TV ratings firm, reported last week that more than 13 million U.S. households with analogue TV sets were unprepared for the switch.
A report last fall by the U.S. Government Accountability Office -- similar to Canada's auditor general - found no comprehensive plan was in place for the transition and that consumer awareness remained low.
Ignored in all this is the unknown number of Canadians who regularly watch U.S. stations via rabbit ears or outside antennas.
Nielsen's Anne Elliott says the question has arisen but her firm does not count the "bonus audience" U.S. broadcasters have in Canada.
A notice on Industry Canada's consumer affairs website warns Canadians not on satellite or cable that they'll need a converter box when Canada makes the final switch to digital transmission on Aug. 31, 2011. It mentions that the U.S. changeover happens next February.
Canadians watching U.S. channels will see public service announcements about the change.
Meanwhile, the CRTC is focusing on Canada's own digital switchover, watching how the U.S. transition happens next year.
"The goal is always to be about two years behind the Americans, to let them kind of work things out," says Peter Foster, the broadcast regulator's acting senior director of TV policy and application.
Some smaller Canadian stations may be allowed to continue broadcasting in analogue after the 2011 switch date, Foster says.
The U.S. plans other uses for its vacated analogue TV frequencies, perhaps for emergency services and data transmission. Canadian stations far enough away from the U.S. border would not interfere with that, Foster says.
Figures included in a CRTC policy paper last year on the digital transition estimated just under 10 per cent of Canadian households relied solely on over-the-air TV signals.
An Industry Canada spokesman says there are currently no plans to subsidize converter-box purchases in Canada.
Analogue-only TV sets have been phased out of U.S. sales, and retailers must put labels on any old stock warning buyers those models will need a converter after next Feb. 17.
Future Shop, one of Canada's biggest electronics retailers, says it sells a couple of analogue-only TV models that will be carried until the fall.
The digital TVs it sells are all capable of receiving analogue signals. There is no plan to drop analogue tuners from newer sets, says Eric Stockner, the chain's director of merchandising for home theatre.
One fear that has dogged the U.S. switchover is the prospect that millions of instantly obsolete TVs could end up in landfills.
Besides the plastic and glass, conventional cathode-ray tube TVs contain toxic metals, notably lead.
Only a few provinces and a minority of U.S. states have programs to recycle electronic waste, says Jason Linnell, who heads the U.S. National Electronic Recycling Centre in West Virginia.
Environment Canada says British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia have regulations and programs that require industry to reclaim TVs after consumers are finished with them.
No one knows what will happen after next Feb. 17, Linnell says.
"This is certainly something that people are looking at, but they're not really sure how much the potential for a problem translates into an actual problem once we do hit February 2009," he says.
If past practice is anything to go by, people who buy a new digital TV aren't necessa
