I’ve never once found autoplay video to enhance a web experience. I’ve never once found a single example to be “interesting”. I don’t care if audio is muted. I don’t want it, full stop.

It’s atrocious UX. It’s hostile to users. It’s presumptive and frankly rude. There’s no excuse for autoplay. Even on YouTube, it’s more often infuriating than not.

Edit: clarified “autoplay video”, not animated GIFs

I've seen some very subtle moving backgrounds that were quite appropriate for the sites they were on.

It's probably too difficult for software to tell the difference between something like a high brow long form interactive article, a tasteful hero banner background, and an annoying popover or sidebar ad.

My least favorite auto-playing videos in a site I use regularly are in the Netflix UI.

Yea, even on sites that specifically cater to serving video (like YouTube) I prefer non-autoplay video, it's an extra click - who cares... it will save me the occasional wall of sound when re-opening a browser with way too many random things open.

People apparently can get very annoyed by an extra click between them and content that they have already indicated they want to see.

Look at the number of complaints people post about EU cookie warning banners, which usually don't even block you from consuming the content on the page, even though they usually can be dismissed in one click. Or the number of complaints if a site puts a sign-up or logic request, dismissable in one click, that obscures any of the content.

Sure, with an extra click to play video, as opposed to an extra click to read an article, it will save annoyance on sites where the person is not there specifically because they clicked a link to see the video.

There are probably more sites where the auto-playing video is an annoyance than where it is the thing you came to the site for, and so blocking auto play is probably a net win for most people--but will they perceive it that way?

You are more likely to notice that something has annoyed you than to notice that something has not annoyed you. With blocking auto play I think a lot of people will only notice it, therefore, when it makes them do an extra click to see something they came to see. They aren't going to notice that it saved them from having to click to mute or pause some ancillary video on a page.

That doesn't mean it should not be added. It just means some care should be taken into how it is presented and configured.

> There are probably more sites where the auto-playing video is an annoyance than where it is the thing you came to the site for, and so blocking auto play is probably a net win for most people--but will they perceive it that way?

I don't know about that. I would think YouTube alone easily accounts for the majority of autoplaying videos that users encounter.

> the occasional wall of sound when re-opening a browser with way too many random things open

Firefox only restores tabs (and thus resumes playing) once I actually select them. This sounds like a better solution for your specific problem. A drawback is it being easier to end with a significant tab graveyard. But won't be able to have it any other way once you're at four-digits open tabs...

I care. When I'm scrolling through dozens or hundreds of videos in a stream an extra click per video is a big ux problem.

Wall of sound I agree with. Disable that. But don't force me to click a video or gif to get it to play.

Reddit, Giphy, Imgur, Youtube.

Those would be the big four which would negatively impact my daily web usage.

Giving other people a to default disable a thing does not force you to do it, too. Giving different people options about how they want to experience the Web would be the entire point.

The media.autoplay flags in about:config provide that option for anyone who wants it (and even more granular controls than those being exposed in the UI here).

Some big browsers need to disable auto-play by default to force websites to actually support commencing and pausing video in terrible tiny javascript video players.

They don't work. I have all of those flags enabled and sites like CNN still autoplay videos. With sound, too, as a matter of fact.

If it's already not possible to implement perfectly, what is being argued for in this thread exactly?

How would it negatively impact you to click / tap on a video to play it?

Look at GoPro's website. They sell video cameras, and their landing page has a muted video showing video taken with their cameras.

Why does it need to autoplay? If I want to watch it I'll click play.

Animated gifs (which are being replaced with gifv autoplay movies) are great IMO. I think the majority of web users don’t mind them.

“Animated gifs” are dead (ish), most likely whenever you see something that you think is a gif, it’s an auto playing video

sex.com

If autoplay videos and gifs were disabled the whole value of that site would disappear. I wish 4chan and Reddit would do it as well. It's great for feed content.

There are plenty of other examples of auto-playing videos being a good thing. Please don't take those away.

> There are a lot of interesting experiences that can be enabled by autoplay.

Yeah, like alerting the participants of a meeting to the fact you are browsing crap on your phone.

Definitely lots of experiences use this solution, and shouldn't be hurt by sites that abuse it (stop going to or use adblock on this sites?).

I am working on a platform that's a mix of Twitch and Netflix. Entering a "show" starts muted autoplay until the audience member explicitly turns on audio. If they're coming to the show URL I give them, presumably they're there for the show.

I can’t understand this design decision. What if they open the URL in a new tab, while still focused on another tab? How do you as a user know something is playing on that new tab?

You’re helping yourself to their bandwidth and local compute without their consent or knowledge.

Why do you think this is okay?

>> Definitely lots of experiences use this solution, and shouldn't be hurt by sites that abuse it (stop going to or use adblock on this sites?).

So your site/idea is OK, but people should stop going to others or use adblock on them.

I don't want to compromise. I don't want a movie to play without me clicking on it, ever. It's my computer, my internet connection, and it should be my choice.

So, it shouldn't be optional?

I like cheese, everyone has to have cheese on all meals!?

I think that comparison is backwards. It's more like "I don't like cheese, so no one should be allowed it"

I don’t see it as backwards.

Autoplay video is like if the waiter just starts shaving parmesan on your salad. If you didn’t want it, you now have to pick the shavings off. Annoying.

Nonautoplay video is like the waiter asking “would you like cheese?” “Yes” “Ok” and they commence shaving it.

I don’t see why we should all have to pick cheese out of our salads because some people are too lazy to have a 3 second interaction to get what they want.

To extend the analogy, I would like to have the option to go to a restaurant (site) order a salad (visit a page) and have that come the way the chef (developer) intended, with cheese (autoplay video). If I don't like this developer or restaurant's judgement I can eat somewhere else. (Or, in the web case, install an extension that blocks autoplay video.)

Except most chefs in your analogy are having the quality, quantity, and proportion of ingredients dictated to them by an owner who may or may not know how to microwave popcorn.

I think the analogy is: I want to see the menu and select what I want to eat. But the chef is forcing me to consume it, with the cheese that I don't want, the instant I open the menu.

Are you still talking about browser option that everybody can set as desired?

It's optional, you can already turn all autoplay off (about:config - media.autoplay.* settings, specifically media.autoplay.default = 1 turns it off)

Sure, if you've remembered to do it. And again for your laptop, your phone, your tablet, your work computer, your partner's laptop... and then again once you've updated your OS, or rebuilt your computer.

I feel like I'm turning this setting off about once a month, usually after it has done something embarrassing or highly irritating on public transport .

This should have been the default since browsers were first able to play audio.

So you are not arguing for choice, you are arguing for forcing your preference on everyone, so that they become the ones who have to set the option back in all of their browser installs.

Yes I am, because the default choice is idiotic, annoying and anti-social.

Setting your preference to autoplay may be irritating if you prefer it the other way, but you won't annoy your co-workers, leak any sensitive info, or wake up your SO before finding it in the wrong state. And the Firefox devs agree with me.

Could maybe add an option with Firefox sync to save browser settings if anyone really misses this "feature".

This is about disabling silent videos autoplaying. Firefox is already disabling videos with audio autoplaying. I am not sure how silent videos could be much more embarrassing or disturbing to people on public transport or your co-workers than an inappropriate image, and I do not agree that they are idiotic or anti-social.

From the title of the article: "Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video and audio". Emphasis mine.

The subthread we are commenting is about all autoplay, starting with a commenter saying the audio-only ban was not enough, and then being told that silent autoplay can also be turned off, but many users probably want it.

> Muted autoplay is still allowed. WTH Mozilla. Just stop. Stop the stupid auto-playing video. Nobody wants it.

Apologies. My comments were intended to be about autoplaying audio.

It's optional. You simply opt out by installing a blocker extension. If enough people want to opt out maybe that's added as a built in switch. (Like the audio blocking this post is about, and popup blocking before that) I think then that's fine too.

Following your analogy, I don't think it would make sense by default for meals to always have no cheese, or for the waiter to always ask if you'd like to include cheese. But i think it's fine for them to allow you to ask not to get any cheese.