[whatwg] Spec should require UAs to have control to mute/ pause audio/ video

[Tab Atkins Jr.]

On Thu, May 7, 2009 at 10:17 AM, Bruce Lawson <brucel at opera.com> wrote:
> This may already be in the spec, but I couldn't find it.
>
> I think the spec should explicity require UAs to provide a mehanism to
> mute audio and to pause video, even if the controls attribute is not set.
>
> This will be of great benefit to screenreader users, as well as to people
> who work in shared environments and who may not be expecting noise.
>
> (There is a precedent for worrying about "mere annoyance": "User agents
> should not provide a public API to cause videos to be shown full-screen. A
> script, combined with a carefully crafted video file, could trick the user
> into thinking a system-modal dialog had been shown, and prompt the user
> for a password. There is also the danger of "mere" annoyance, with pages
> launching full-screen videos when links are clicked or pages navigated.")
>
> Should autoplay be removed as an attribute of audio and video, precisely
> to remove such annoyance from people who rely on aural browsing? While
> there are video sites such as youTube that do play videos automatically,
> others such as vimeo don't. Is there an archive that lists the use-cases
> for autoplay and contrasts it with the "annoyance" and accessibility
> issues?.
>
> (see
> http://www.brucelawson.co.uk/2009/accessibility-of-html5-video-and-audio-elements/)

I don't see why this should be a browser requirement.  UAs are
*allowed* to provide such a facility to their users, so if your UA
doesn't, complain until they do!

~TJ