Stuff - Disable autoplay in Firefox on macOS

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granada29

68 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 57

#279855 12-Nov-2020 19:17

The Stuff website seems to override the autoplay disable setting in Firefox on macOS Catalina. I don't mind watching some of their video items, but I would rather have control over it than to have have their bombardment of often completely irrelevant items.

I have disabled autoplay in the Firefox settings and have no problems at all on the Herald site, YouTube etc etc - but Stuff seems to be particularly aggressive.

I'm wondering if I may have missed an about:config setting, but surely setting Autoplay (Video and Audio) to disabled should be enough. I'd welcome tips from anyone who has done this successfully.

Thanks

RunningMan

9189 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 4842

#2602988 12-Nov-2020 19:29

You can have different settings for each website, so if you already have a custom setting for Stuff, then this may include autoplay on.

⌘I (or tools->page info) then permissions.

granada29

68 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 57

#2603000 12-Nov-2020 20:00

Nope - that wasn't it. The settings look OK. What I did notice just now is that when scrolling through a page, a video is paused until the cursor enters the frame of the video. The video then starts to play - no clicking involved, just scrolling the page so that the cursor enters the frame.

granada29

68 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 57

#2607525 20-Nov-2020 15:08

The reply I received from Stuff:

At the moment these videos are set to auto play once hovered over, I dont believe there is a setting to disable this in the browser, we are reviewing this product and feedback like yours will be taken into consideration.

Kind regards,

Andi Stott
Product Operations Technical Specialist

E: digitaltechsupport@stuff.co.nz

yitz

2239 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 594

#2607562 20-Nov-2020 15:32

On Chrome, Autoplay videos that were auto play only on hover only a few weeks ago now also just play automatically (muted) on scroll for me too, I've noticed this on Stuff and also Twitter, Facebook.

Some elaborate browser side A/B test? I have also suddenly started getting trending searches when I am not logged in on Chrome, thought my browser settings have corrupted at first.