1208439 - An easy way to turn off autoplay of videos and sounds

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 1458249

(Firefox :: Settings UI, enhancement)

Description

[marko_avlijau0161]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Ubuntu; Linux x86_64; rv:40.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/40.0
Build ID: 20150826185918

Steps to reproduce:

User should have a user friendly checkbox that says "Allow autoplay of videos and sounds". If turned off, websites should not be allowed to autoplay videos of sounds in any of the following ways:
HTML 5 video
Javascript activated
Flash
ANY OTHER WAY


Actual results:

Sometimes causually surfing the web someone starts shouting at me at very large volume (be it ads or autoplay on sites or youtube suddenly restarting or whatever).
I stop, my fight or flight is activated, my stress hormones go up and after 2 seconds first thing I do it turn off the speakers.

Before I would open several tabs at once before switching to them. I have learned now not to do that because one of those tabs is going to start shouting at me. That's a big shame.

Even when I open one tab at a time, websites still shout at me and it's not clear where I have to click to stop that abuse.


Expected results:

When I click new link that leads to website that wants to play video or sound nothing should happen.

When I switch to that tab I should get a pop up saying something like:
"This website wants to autoplay video or sounds.
Do you allow?"

There should also be a volume control for that tab and volume controls should be saved in settings on per site bases.

Comment 1

[Gingerbread Man]

(In reply to marko_avlijau0161 from comment #0)
> HTML 5 video

1. Paste about:config?filter=media.autoplay.enabled into the location bar, then press Enter.
2. In the search results, double-click media.autoplay.enabled to set its value to false.

> Flash

In the Add-ons Manager, Plugins category, you can set various plug-ins (e.g. Shockwave Flash, Silverlight) to “Ask to Activate”. Though last I checked, some videos still slipped by with this setting. The Flashblock add-on may fare better.

> There should also be a volume control for that tab

Starting with Firefox 42, there's a per-tab sound indicator icon. It allows you to quickly mute the tab in question.

Comment 2

[MarjaE]

I'm strobe-sensitive. I've got both autoplay settings set to false, and a total of 3 about:config fixes, all plugins disabled, 6 animation-blocking extensions, and 10 animation-blocking user styles.

... And I'm still getting hit by autoplaying video.

I'm unable to determine the format of the video, to see which current tools aren't working or which additional tools are needed.

Autoplay is a health hazard.

Comment 3

[Damian Yerrick]

Would fixing Bug 1391501 (let WebExtensions turn autoplay on and off) fix this?

Comment 4

[MarjaE]

There is now a Preferences option. However, it is only reachable via scrolling or search, not via Page Down on the appropriate Preferences page. Also, the existing safety settings were disabled when the new ones were introduced.

Comment 5

[Gingerbread Man]

(In reply to marko_avlijau0161 from comment #0)

HTML 5 video

Autoplay won't be blocked for standalone video and audio: bug 1477415.

Flash

Adobe will drop support for Flash Player by the end of the year, and so will Firefox.

Closing as a duplicate because the rest is under about:preferences#privacy - Permissions section.

(In reply to MarjaE from comment #4)

There is now a Preferences option. However, it is only reachable via scrolling or search, not via Page Down

Bug 1586409

Also, the existing safety settings were disabled when the new ones were introduced.

Bug 1617489, comment 1