Tim Armstrong breaks the news at Ignition. Michael Seto/Business Insider In the past six months, something has changed with the TV industry, according to AOL CEO Tim Armstrong.

On stage at our Ignition conference, Armstrong said he recently heard from an advertiser who said he got a rebate for his TV ad budget because the ads weren't going to be filled. The advertiser needed to spend the extra money digitally as quickly as possible.

It's unclear whether this was just a one-time blip or the start of something different. Armstrong seemed to believe the latter. He thinks digital video advertising is finally starting to suck dollars from TV advertising.

New data from Nielsen explains why this is happening. Last quarter, TV viewing was down 4%, while video streaming was up 60%.

Off stage, Armstrong pointed us toward an interview Daryl Simm, CEO of Omnicom’s media operations, participated in with The Wall Street Journal in October. In the interview, Simm recommended advertisers shift 10% to 25% of their budgets away from TV to digital.

When an agency is telling people to shift their budgets, it's a big deal. It means the money that's been supporting traditional TV is going to go towards digital properties. As that money flows out of traditional TV, the traditional TV industry is going to struggle to do what it's done for years.

As for whether this is just a blip or a long-term thing, Armstrong told us that he recently hosted Thanksgiving at his house. He had a bunch of kids over, from teenagers to young adults in their 20s. He saw them all sitting around in the living room watching video on their phones instead of looking up at the TV.

Are those kids going to suddenly change and start watching regular TV when they get older? Probably not.