Firefox 66 to Block Audible Sound from Autoplay Video and Audio by Default

Terrible for so many reasons. Chrome did it first, and now Firefox wants to follow in its footsteps (as usual - Google sets web standards now, and Mozilla rolls over and says we better do it too). There are so many use-cases where auto play sound and video are legit and valid. Yes, some sites and platforms abuse this, but a lot don't. We're being punished for bad apples again, and that's not the way to run society. Common sense is gone.

This should have been implemented as a user preference that by default isn't enabled. Instead, they just force their will by default on everyone when a standard existed allowing for the auto play of audio and video. Great way to break a lot of applications. Especially for the deaf and blind (when it comes to voice to text and text to voice). Now they have to "interact" with the page before the media will play. Lots of games and other things will be broken from these changes. Great job guys! Let's continue to break things that used to work. Great way to develop applications. This used to work, but now doesn't. Thanks Google for your BS. Read how many people developers were unhappy about Google's changes here:

https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2017/09/autoplay-policy-changes

How embarrassing.

#meltdownoftheweek
 
Terrible for so many reasons. Chrome did it first, and now Firefox wants to follow in its footsteps (as usual - Google sets web standards now, and Mozilla rolls over and says we better do it too). There are so many use-cases where auto play sound and video are legit and valid. Yes, some sites and platforms abuse this, but a lot don't. We're being punished for bad apples again, and that's not the way to run society. Common sense is gone.

This should have been implemented as a user preference that by default isn't enabled. Instead, they just force their will by default on everyone when a standard existed allowing for the auto play of audio and video. Great way to break a lot of applications. Especially for the deaf and blind (when it comes to voice to text and text to voice). Now they have to "interact" with the page before the media will play. Lots of games and other things will be broken from these changes. Great job guys! Let's continue to break things that used to work. Great way to develop applications. This used to work, but now doesn't. Thanks Google for your BS. Read how many people developers were unhappy about Google's changes here:

https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2017/09/autoplay-policy-changes

How embarrassing.

shouldn't you go blame those people who screwed it up in the first place , and not Mozilla.?
 
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Pocket is quite literally the most useful tool for figuring out how much tracking all the ISPs and internet companies do on you. Seriously... I recently made a comment on this website about how millennials can't keep up with old tripe traditions like "an engagement ring should cost 2 months of your salary" and guess what shows up on Firefox homepage with pocket a few hours later...
View attachment 140007

Its basically a daily reminder that ones in control only view you as a number with a dollar sign in front of it.


Personbally I demand four things from all software I use:

- No cloud
- No Data sharing
- No AI automation
- Minimal or no ads

As long as the above three are met, we are going to be just fine. If not, there is going to be a problem.
 
Pocket is quite literally the most useful tool for figuring out how much tracking all the ISPs and internet companies do on you. Seriously... I recently made a comment on this website about how millennials can't keep up with old tripe traditions like "an engagement ring should cost 2 months of your salary" and guess what shows up on Firefox homepage with pocket a few hours later...
View attachment 140007

Its basically a daily reminder that ones in control only view you as a number with a dollar sign in front of it.


Also,

I played a little with Firefox last night. I disabled pocket, the built in password manager, all website notifications and all telemetry. I still need to do some more reading to see what else I need to block. I could go with Waterfox, but I want to take advantage of the features in the latest builds that are not in the ESR build, and I don't care at all about legacy plugins, so I guess I'll disable all the stuff I don't want on my own instead.

One feature I really liked was the setting for tracker blocking. I set it to strict. There was a warning it might break some sites, but none of the ones I tested broke.

It seems to do a very good job of defeating cross site tracking cookies and links to tracking services. I'm blocking stuff I didn't even know existed, like Pagefair, Blockthrough and a ton of Google statistics and tracking collecting sites.
 
[H] community is slacking...

You can already turn off autoplay videos in Firefox. As of version 64 do this:

Open about:config
Search for media.autoplay.default

Default: 0 (enable autoplay)

Change this to 1 (disable autoplay)

Now when you open a Youtube video you actually have to click on the video for it to start playing.
 
I don't understand why everybody stopped doing this. It used to be an option in FF and Edge. Then all of the sudden they both removed the option. Edge brought it back with the October update and I have been using it since. I haven't missed FF at all, but will probably switch back once Edge starts using Chromium.
 
Personbally I demand four things from all software I use:

- No cloud
- No Data sharing
- No AI automation
- Minimal or no ads

As long as the above three are met, we are going to be just fine. If not, there is going to be a problem.

You might add a math checker to what you need...;)
 
Terrible for so many reasons. Chrome did it first, and now Firefox wants to follow in its footsteps (as usual - Google sets web standards now, and Mozilla rolls over and says we better do it too). There are so many use-cases where auto play sound and video are legit and valid. Yes, some sites and platforms abuse this, but a lot don't. We're being punished for bad apples again, and that's not the way to run society. Common sense is gone.

This should have been implemented as a user preference that by default isn't enabled. Instead, they just force their will by default on everyone when a standard existed allowing for the auto play of audio and video. Great way to break a lot of applications. Especially for the deaf and blind (when it comes to voice to text and text to voice). Now they have to "interact" with the page before the media will play. Lots of games and other things will be broken from these changes. Great job guys! Let's continue to break things that used to work. Great way to develop applications. This used to work, but now doesn't. Thanks Google for your BS. Read how many people developers were unhappy about Google's changes here:

https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2017/09/autoplay-policy-changes

How embarrassing.

Disagree. Auto play of anything should never be used for any reason.

I mean, MAYBE if the sole purpose of the link your are visiting is to display video or sound (like a Netflix link, or a direct Link to a YouTube video) but only maybe then. Even in this scenario, it isn't too much for the user to click once.

Personally I'd like us to take all web design back to the 90's. Static HTML only, with no plugins, code or logic ever running client side.

That - IMHO - is the very definition of good web design. Keep it simple, and never run code or scripts on a machine that isn't yours without making it extremely clear that the user explicitly wants you to.

The simplest design is always the best design. And I'm talking simple from the perspective of complexity of implementation, not from the perspective of ease of use.

And if you can't make your site work without running scripts or plugins on the visiting machine, maybe you shouldn't be doing whatever it is you are trying to do.

I for one hope we can get to the point where something like "NoScript" is built into every single browser and cannot be disabled, forcing web designers to create simple sites that don't break when scripts are blocked if they want to ever be seen by anyone.
 
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Terrible for so many reasons. Chrome did it first, and now Firefox wants to follow in its footsteps (as usual - Google sets web standards now, and Mozilla rolls over and says we better do it too). There are so many use-cases where auto play sound and video are legit and valid. Yes, some sites and platforms abuse this, but a lot don't. We're being punished for bad apples again, and that's not the way to run society. Common sense is gone.

This should have been implemented as a user preference that by default isn't enabled. Instead, they just force their will by default on everyone when a standard existed allowing for the auto play of audio and video. Great way to break a lot of applications. Especially for the deaf and blind (when it comes to voice to text and text to voice). Now they have to "interact" with the page before the media will play. Lots of games and other things will be broken from these changes. Great job guys! Let's continue to break things that used to work. Great way to develop applications. This used to work, but now doesn't. Thanks Google for your BS. Read how many people developers were unhappy about Google's changes here:

https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2017/09/autoplay-policy-changes

How embarrassing.

Well the simple and obvious answer to that is to enable it back. Not that hard.
 
Finally you all can watch porn, at night, next to your other while they sleep and never have to worry - Did I turn my mute on?
 
Also,

I played a little with Firefox last night. I disabled pocket, the built in password manager, all website notifications and all telemetry. I still need to do some more reading to see what else I need to block. I could go with Waterfox, but I want to take advantage of the features in the latest builds that are not in the ESR build, and I don't care at all about legacy plugins, so I guess I'll disable all the stuff I don't want on my own instead.

One feature I really liked was the setting for tracker blocking. I set it to strict. There was a warning it might break some sites, but none of the ones I tested broke.

It seems to do a very good job of defeating cross site tracking cookies and links to tracking services. I'm blocking stuff I didn't even know existed, like Pagefair, Blockthrough and a ton of Google statistics and tracking collecting sites.

Google, Amazon, Facebook, Akamai... those four are the ones I see the most, probably 90% of all sites have some affiliation with those four. Probably a little hyperbole, but I don't think its that far off.

Firefox on its own is pretty good now at blocking a lot of content, I have it set to delete cookies and browsing history every-time I close. I could disable Pocket as well, but I like the occasional sciencey distractions. In the past I extensively used noscript, but its tricky because you enable the top layer website, and the list gets populated with 10 more objects from various sites that now require permission. Nowadays I only turn on noscript on certain sites where redirects and popups happen frequently. Don't know what the correlation is, but porn sites and religious sites are the worst offenders of redirects, popups, generally annoying adverts. The latter is the worst because of the malicious ads, porn sites tend to be strangely "virus" free. Firefox + Noscript is like a condom for internet viewing... nothing gets in or out unless you let it...

I also disable the content blocking for [H], as this is one of the few sites I don't mind making money from "tracking" me.
 
This should have been implemented as a user preference that by default isn't enabled.

I agree with a lot of what you said, I just hope it's a preference that's not only easily disabled, but something I can easily inform someone else how to disable.

I know the set-in-stone Chrome implementation ruined internet radio for a few people.

Also, some sites that were the worst abusers that need to be silenced figured out ways to make noise work, anyway.
 
Terrible for so many reasons. Chrome did it first, and now Firefox wants to follow in its footsteps (as usual - Google sets web standards now, and Mozilla rolls over and says we better do it too). There are so many use-cases where auto play sound and video are legit and valid. Yes, some sites and platforms abuse this, but a lot don't. We're being punished for bad apples again, and that's not the way to run society. Common sense is gone.

This should have been implemented as a user preference that by default isn't enabled. Instead, they just force their will by default on everyone when a standard existed allowing for the auto play of audio and video. Great way to break a lot of applications. Especially for the deaf and blind (when it comes to voice to text and text to voice). Now they have to "interact" with the page before the media will play. Lots of games and other things will be broken from these changes. Great job guys! Let's continue to break things that used to work. Great way to develop applications. This used to work, but now doesn't. Thanks Google for your BS. Read how many people developers were unhappy about Google's changes here:

https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2017/09/autoplay-policy-changes

How embarrassing.

I do not agree.

There are ZERO use cases in which your website should waste my battery without my consent. Ask me first.

Extra work for developers? Awesome - extra demand and opportunity to make money.
 
I also disable the content blocking for [H], as this is one of the few sites I don't mind making money from "tracking" me.

I donate via Patreon instead.

I trust Kyle wouldn't abuse anything, but all these tracking services are third parties, and they can't be trusted :(
 
So, I am piloting Firefox on my desktop at home and at work, and thus far the experience is mostly positive. There are a few things I don't like. Webkit/Blink seems to render things prettier and scroll smoother, but I can get used to that, Time will tell if I keep it.

I wonder, how does Firefox perform on the mobile platform. Is it worth it on my Android devices as well?
 
I have Firefox 66 now, and this wasn't as great as I had hoped.

Videos still autoplay all over the place. I just want them gone, with the option to play them with a click. Guess I am going to have to keep using a plugin for that.

How goddamned difficult is it for web designers to understand that they should never ever under any circumstance design sites with any audio or video acontent what so ever that automatically plays?
 
I have Firefox 66 now, and this wasn't as great as I had hoped.

Videos still autoplay all over the place. I just want them gone, with the option to play them with a click. Guess I am going to have to keep using a plugin for that.

How goddamned difficult is it for web designers to understand that they should never ever under any circumstance design sites with any audio or video acontent what so ever that automatically plays?

Actually, I guess plugins are necessary. You just have to go into about:config and change variables.

The one to change is "media.autoplay.default". The setting is counter-intuitive. By default it is set at 0, which allows videos to autoplay. Setting it to "1" does not. Every autoplay video I have tested thus far now gets a play icon overlay, and you have to click if you want to start it.

Success!

upload_2019-3-24_1-0-23.png
 
Got it to work on the CBS site, but didn't work for YouTube why can't it just be simple and work like you'd expect everywhere. Oh well if works at all some places better than nothing.
 
What are you even talking about? "So many use cases?" Name more than 5.

And the deaf and blind? They don't have to use Firefox lmfao. They are probably less than 5% of all users.

I'm switching to Firefox today because fuck autoplay.
Okay, so you're saying that now that I finally switched my blind mother to using Firefox instead of IE for safety, I should now have to switch her to Chrome because you personally (and a lot of the other apathetic [H] members) don't care? Way to tell yourself you're so important that any inconvenience on your part matters more than the people that are already inconvenienced more than you can possibly imagine. Pat yourself on the back, it's actually an accomplishment being so selfish.
 
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