For all the regular users of the Internet, the nightmare of auto-playing media is about to come to an end. Ever opened more tabs at once and a video-ad started playing in the background on one of them, and you couldn’t really tell which one it was? Yes, us too, but Chrome is about to make our lives a lot easier.
Auto-playing media has only recently gained great traction to the point that it has become a common yet annoying occurrence, especially when it comes to websites that rely heavily on delivering content through podcasts or videos. Fortunately, Google (owner of Chrome) has finally heard the cries of millions of users who got tired of stopping the auto-playing audio or video message.
In response, Google started developing a new Chrome feature that will make it impossible for users to be unpleasantly surprised by media that starts playing as soon as you enter the website. According to a post on the official blog, Google Chrome’s Dev Channel has included a new feature that stops any videos from playing automatically unless they are in the tab you’re currently browsing.
In other words, not even YouTube will be able to start their ad videos if you open another tab before it starts loading. Can you hear the sigh of relief coming from the great majority of Chrome users? This new feature will be extremely welcomed as the issue has been signaled especially by users who like to keep a lot of tabs open at once.
This is not Google’s first attempt of making automatically played videos less annoying; the browser had already had a small icon incorporated in the tab that contained any sort of audio, making it easier for users to know which tab was transmitting sound.
But this new feature available in Chrome’s Dev Channel is the first time when a browser takes preventive measures against this intrusive type of media. Auto-playing media is basically prohibited until the user will actually see the media in the foregrounded.
As with all features found in Chrome’s Dev Channel, there’s a chance the headache-saving tool won’t make it in the browser’s main stable channel. But users all around the world are crossing their fingers Chrome will do what they have to do and quickly implement it.
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