It sucks when you load a webpage and it starts playing a video with sound. It's startling and bothers people around you. (When it happens I right-click on the tab and select "mute tab" from the menu – a top I learned on the Recomendo newsletter I co-write.)
Fortunately Google announce that it will being introducing new controls to allow users to disable audio on individual sites, followed by another release that will disable autoplay completely (unless you are that 1 person out of 10 million who like to be surprised with obnoxious blaring.
The company justifies this new approach by saying that while "autoplay can make it faster and easier to consume on the web," unexpected media playback is also "one of the most frequent user concerns" because it "can use data, consume power, and make unwanted noise while browsing." A side benefit, Google argues, is that these changes will also unify desktop and mobile web behavior, making web media development more predictable across platforms and browsers.
When it comes to unwanted content while browsing, Google is just getting started. The company announced in June that Chrome is getting a built-in ad blocker. The feature will block all the ads on a site (including Google's own ads) if just one ad doesn't meet certain standards. Chrome's ad blocker is slated to arrive in "early 2018" — right after Chrome has won its war on autoplay.
Via Venture Beat:
