Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video and audio

Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by JohnFen on Monday February 04, 2019 @12:54PM (#19078683)

> Is there anyone that actually likes the autoplay when watching Netflix on TV?

I can't think of a single time when I have encountered autoplay and liked it. Not even with video streamers like Netflix, YouTube, etc.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by munchbunny on Monday February 04, 2019 @07:11PM (#19081937)

The only time I've found myself wanting autoplay is when it's an obvious playlist, such as TV shows on Netflix or explicit playlists on Youtube.

All of the other times, it's really just irritating, and I've only gotten more annoyed lately because of it. Netflix just promotes its newest shows, and frankly I don't watch that many Netflix originals. Youtube... the recommendations are fine, but the next video selection is very little hit and mostly miss for me.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by dcbadacd on Monday February 04, 2019 @01:19PM (#19078982)

I honestly like YouTube's autoplay, as I use YouTube to listen to music the autoplay feature allows me to find new artists and songs to listen to. I get a much better "Radio" experience than I have gotten from say Spotify.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by zaarn on Monday February 04, 2019 @02:52PM (#19079989)

Youtube's autoplay (ie, play another video after the current one) will likely continue to work as it doesn't reload the page. You can also enable autoplay on a site-per-site basis if you want it to occur regardless.

Personally I'd rather prefer autoplay being something I give permission for than the site asking for forgiveness (which in 99% of cases I will answer by muting the site permanently).

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by yipbub on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @01:16AM (#19083351)

How'd you mute a site permanently?

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by zaarn on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @03:35AM (#19083769)

I use "MuteLinks" by "Shaxine" from AMO to mute sites permanently.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by chopin on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @02:10AM (#19083515)

Revoke JavaScript permission. That's what I do (in case I ever allowed it).

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by ouchjars on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @02:21AM (#19083549)

I agreed until recently, but now my music autoplay is very inclined to get stuck in a loop of music I've already heard (did I listen to those tracks too many times?). The additional recommendations can still be good but need more manual intervention than letting it autoplay.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by joncrane on Monday February 04, 2019 @09:02PM (#19082527)

Yeah Youtube's algorithm for playing stuff you will like is pretty good.

Know who else's algorithm has done the same thing for me? Pandora. It's basically my go-to music app. I have groomed a station to be exactly what I love and it just sticks to a formula, automatically adds in new releases by the artists I already follow, and plays music I like.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by bhandziuk on Monday February 04, 2019 @02:09PM (#19079563)

The weird thing about Youtube's autoplay is that if it is a video you actually want to watch you need to rewind the start when you click on it because there's no audio during autoplay and it starts the video from where autoplay "left off".

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by brokenmachine on Monday February 04, 2019 @07:47PM (#19082190)

That doesn't happen to me. There is audio during autoplay.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by bhandziuk on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @03:50PM (#19089703)

Maybe one of us changed a setting. My auto play has closed captions and no audio.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by stefan_ on Monday February 04, 2019 @08:06PM (#19082288)

It is so annoying because the reasoning is so insultingly simple and ultimately, the height of irony and stupidity. I can see the middle manager in my mind boasting how this feature increased their key video playback time metric by 5% so it's here to stay!

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by grawprog on Monday February 04, 2019 @12:19PM (#19078244)

I don't mind when it autoplays the next episode of something i'm watching. Though i find it stops the autoplay and asks me if i'm still watching at probably the worst times.

I can't stand though when it autoplays trailers or previews or automatically starts something new when i've finished something i'm watching. Scrolling through netflix and having things autoplay as I scroll through is annoying as all fuck.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by jerf on Monday February 04, 2019 @12:30PM (#19078398)

I find I'm being subconsciously trained to keep moving through the listings before the autoplay triggers. In addition to my distaste for them, they also seem to freeze up the app for a moment while they start; it's less than a second, but it's noticeable.

I assume it's driving engagement with people in general, but it inhibits my engagement.

Which goes back to one of my perennial frustrations with all this tracking and A/B testing bullshit; they're tracking my every mouse movement, they're slicing and dicing pennies in an effort to advertise at me, but when it comes to something I'd actually like, like them noticing that not only do I not "want" these autoplaying ads but that they actually decreased the very metrics they care about for me, suddenly our monstrous tracking machine with seemingly endless resources to stare at me like Sauron's All-Seeing Eye goes all blind on me.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by grawprog on Monday February 04, 2019 @12:41PM (#19078534)

> they also seem to freeze up the app for a moment while they start; it's less than a second, but it's noticeable.

It's extremely noticable in the roku app. It pauses for a couple seconds every time you navigate so you can't really do anything until the autoplay loads. You end up seeing a few seconds of it for every single item you hover over.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by ggreer on Monday February 04, 2019 @11:04PM (#19082948)

I cancelled my Netflix subscription because of the auto-playing previews. I'm surprised people put up with them, let alone that they increase engagement. Half the time the previews are auto-generated. They have a few clips of the show along with some generic music. One of the tracks was reused so often that I started to think of it as the Netflix theme.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by arundelo on Tuesday February 12, 2019 @11:26PM (#19150401)

I'm surprised people put up with them

I don't like them at all but I do most of my Netflixing on my iPhone, where it doesn't happen.

(When I do go to the Netflix site in a web browser I sometimes temporarily use "Mute site" which is a pretty crazy thing for a site for watching movies to make you want to do!)

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by sj4nz on Monday February 04, 2019 @09:00PM (#19082515)

I'm _this_ close to cancelling Netflix because of this behavior on Roku. Also the utter lack of closed captions configurability is wearing on my nerves.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by Taylor_OD on Monday February 04, 2019 @12:40PM (#19078513)

Yeah. I've been bingeing a few episodes of the office each night for the last month or so. I like the autoplay.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by KZeillmann on Monday February 04, 2019 @01:30PM (#19079122)

Guess there's a conflation of terms. I think a lot of people enjoy the "automatically play the next episode after this one ends" feature. Recently, however, Netflix has added a "blast sound out of my TV when I hover over something I might want to watch" which I never want. If I'm interested, I'll click in and watch the trailer. I rarely want it to start playing a video just cause I hovered over the title.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by ketralnis on Monday February 04, 2019 @05:44PM (#19081413)

I can't find anywhere on the screen that doesn't make noise (and usually only after several seconds of false security). I've just stopped opening netflix unless I already know what I want to watch

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by tyingq on Monday February 04, 2019 @01:42PM (#19079267)

Yes...that's the one I was talking about. Autoplay the next episode is fine.

Autoplay every show I barely hover over? No, thanks.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by u02sgb on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @03:37AM (#19083779)

Particularly when the advert is for their show "sex education"and my young children are in the room!

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by Taylor_OD on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @12:22PM (#19087344)

Ah. Now I understand. I believe there is an option to shut this off. It really annoyed me when that happened and I remember doing some googling and shutting it off. The videos still autoplay but the sound doesnt.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by delecti on Monday February 04, 2019 @12:28PM (#19078367)

You can block the Netflix autoplay element of the page in ublock. Thus far it seems to have had no other effect.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by tyingq on Monday February 04, 2019 @12:47PM (#19078615)

Ahh, this on my television with a Roku.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by LUmBULtERA on Monday February 04, 2019 @09:32PM (#19082647)

Makes me wonder if we can block it with Pi-hole then?

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by yipbub on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @01:17AM (#19083356)

Doubt you can block it like that without blocking netflix. The source domain is probably be the same.

I assume the Pi Hole still uses DNS to block.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by imgabe on Monday February 04, 2019 @02:12PM (#19079607)

There is a setting in your Netflix profile. I assume it stops it on every device, I haven't tried it though.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by jm4 on Monday February 04, 2019 @04:41PM (#19080907)

That only stops the next episode in a show from automatically playing when the current episode ends. It doesn't get rid of the obnoxious autoplay previews when you are browsing.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by ratherbefuddled on Monday February 04, 2019 @04:09PM (#19080657)

I can only see a setting for autoplay next episode, not for autoplaying trailers as a scroll through their "library".

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by tyingq on Monday February 04, 2019 @02:36PM (#19079842)

Oh, that would be great...will have a look tonight.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by glennpratt on Monday February 04, 2019 @08:44PM (#19082439)

That's awful. I hope that never comes to the phone app (we use Chromecasts, no TV UI). It does happen on the Coming Soon page, which is not promising.

We pay for Netflix to bypass this sort of noise.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by MadraRua on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @04:09AM (#19083888)

"Is there anyone that actually likes the autoplay when watching Netflix on TV?"

Emphatically No.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by chaostheory on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @12:38PM (#19087470)

I like it. Before I didn't even bother playing shows that had a bad static image. I like the quick instant previews because it's inline with my intent: I'm deciding whether or not I want to watch as opposed to the auto-play garbage on the web that's virtually on every news site - I want to read the news articles and not watch and listen to a 30 second blurb where most of the content is an ad that I can't ignore

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by kbenson on Monday February 04, 2019 @07:42PM (#19082143)

I don't mind the autoplay of next episode, or the autoplay if the preview in the preview pane, but I absolutely hate that after the preview plays long enough it will auto start the epiaode/movie.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by JohnTHaller on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @02:08AM (#19083507)

It does the same on the Xbox One. It sucks. Every Netflix-using friend I've asked about it hates it.

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by Aissen on Tuesday February 05, 2019 @10:47AM (#19086341)

I used to hate it, but now I abuse this to watch the trailers that autoplay.

Make no mistake: Netflix has certainly been measuring how well this works and the impact it has on the product. What we might hate has been proved to improve metrix Netflix seems to care about…

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Re:Firefox 66 to block automatically playing audible video a... by hilyen on Monday February 04, 2019 @09:54PM (#19082714)

Netflix loves it I’m sure! ;)

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