OT: Disable the Embedded Video from this site

[onesimus]

Does anyone know how I can disable/turn off the Youtube videos that automatically play on this site?

i.e at the moment it's a video of " Every throw from Gavin Wimsatt versus Miami"

It can't be turned off or paused and it follows you as you scroll.

 

[newell138]

Why would you want to turn off GW highlights?

 

[e5fdny]

Does anyone know how I can disable/turn off the Youtube videos that automatically play on this site?

i.e at the moment it's a video of " Every throw from Gavin Wimsatt versus Miami"

It can't be turned off or paused and it follows you as you scroll.

On a desktop, make your screen view larger.

 

[mildone]

Use an ad-blocker.

 

[Knight Shift]

This panda is for hire. Worked for me.

 

[onesimus]

Use an ad-blocker.

Yeah I used to use uBlock Origin and didn't have this issue. However, my company's IT policy recently required that we can't use any browser extensions they don't approve. So we're back at this.

 

[Knight Shift]

Yeah I used to use uBlock Origin and didn't have this issue. However, my company's IT policy recently required that we can't use any browser extensions they don't approve. So we're back at this.

Sometimes in your browser settings you can disable/supress video. Which browser?

 

[Kbee3]

I see it all the time...over on the right-hand side of my screen. And that's with an ad blocker.
BTW, I've seen enough of the one where Dremel totally whiffs on a block for someone who has just caught a pass in the flat.

 

[mildone]

Auto play video is a ridiculously lame, almost always irritating, “feature” of the “modern” internet. It makes the internet worse, not better.

If it’s not an actual video watching site, like YouTube, there should be no automatic playing video. And for damn sure the video shouldn’t relocate itself on the web page over the top of everything when people zoom the page in to focus on what they’re interested in.

Both things are examples of horrifically bad, intrusive UX.

 

[e5fdny]

Yeah I used to use uBlock Origin and didn't have this issue. However, my company's IT policy recently required that we can't use any browser extensions they don't approve. So we're back at this.

Like I said earlier, if you're on a work computer just make the screen view larger.

 

[onesimus]

Like I said earlier, if you're on a work computer just make the screen view larger.

What do you mean by this?

Zooming in?

 

[onesimus]

Sometimes in your browser settings you can disable/supress video. Which browser?

Chrome

 

[e5fdny]

What do you mean by this?

Zooming in?

Zooming OUT.

I made my screen view big enough where that video is off the monitor.

 

[onesimus]

Zooming OUT.

I made my screen view big enough where that video is off the monitor.

That's Zooming in no? I guess that "works" but not the ideal solution.

Thanks though. Better than nothing.

 

[e5fdny]

That's Zooming in no? I guess that "works" but not the ideal solution.

Thanks though. Better than nothing.

Not ideal, yes.

So far this move is working for me.

But have noticed I’ve had to bump it up a bit…started I think at 125, then 150, now 175.

 

[Knight Shift]

Chrome

I looked and Chrome does not let you do that. Firefox has a setting. My office mates mock me for using Firefox and tell me Chrome is where it is at. I don't see it. Good luck.

 

[retired711]

I looked and Chrome does not let you do that. Firefox has a setting. My office mates mock me for using Firefox and tell me Chrome is where it is at. I don't see it. Good luck.

Yes, Chrome is crap. OTOH, a number of lazy web designers now make it impossible to use Firefox. (My theory is that all IT people are 14-year old boys -- brilliant, perhaps, but lacking in the slightest bit of common sense.)

I have no problem with the video -- thank heavens the audio is muted. Beside, we all know that we can say "we knew him when" when Greg leads us to the national championship that @rutgersal l is always predicting.

 

[DJ Spanky]

I looked and Chrome does not let you do that. Firefox has a setting. My office mates mock me for using Firefox and tell me Chrome is where it is at. I don't see it. Good luck.

Much prefer Firefox over Chrome

 

[rurichdog]

Chrome is 65% of the entire usage share of all browsers on the internet.

That joke Firefox is less than 3%

What was that about Chrome sucks and everyone in I.T. are 14 years old?

 

[retired711]

Chrome is 65% of the entire usage share of all browsers on the internet.

That joke Firefox is less than 3%

What was that about Chrome sucks and everyone in I.T. are 14 years old?

3% is 178 million people. That's not chicken feed. And the browser is a bad one. You need an add-on in order to be able to know the pagination of a chrome document (and hence which pages you want to print) and it seems impossible to turn off notifications. Chrome also has declared war on other ad-blockers. Indeed -- a recent article by Forbes' cybersecurity expert advises its readers to strongly consider returning to Firefox.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kateof...o-quit-and-switch-to-firefox/?sh=663834926ba8

 

[RUScrew85]

Why would you want to turn off GW highlights?

Yeah there's only like three of them. How long can it take?

 

[Ridge 22]

It's the worst 'feature' of this site. Embarrassingly bad it can't be deactivated

 

[ashokan]

If people are on a widescreen with fully open browser the vids show-up on the side.
If you take your mouse and use corners to make browser page about 8-9" across, the videos go to the top of the page and not the side. While scrolling, the top vid never shows for me (FF) even when going to different threads. The key is to not go fullscreen

 

[MrsScrew]

I don't see any videos unless I click on them, I don't even see Twitter links unless I click on them because of the blocker I have.

@RUScrew85 which blocker do we use?

 

[RUScrew85]

I don't see any videos unless I click on them, I don't even see Twitter links unless I click on them because of the blocker I have.

@RUScrew85 which blocker do we use?

I just told Twitter that you live here and they were afraid to get you mad at them so they don't autoplay them for you.

 

[29PAS]

I use Firefox for this site and don't see them. Or maybe it's Ad Block that's doing it. Doesn't matter as I hate seeing them.

 

[mildone]

For technically proficient people who have the option to install third party browser extensions or plugins, if you want to have extremely fine-grained control over what happens "automatically" on all websites, you can install the NoScript extension.

That extension will initially blacklist every script on every website by default. You then can selectively permit various scripts to run while leaving others blocked.

You also get to see just how many third party scripts are included on many popular websites. Many of those scripts have no value at all to site visitors (they collect information about you, or gather stats about your visit bundled and sold to big data companies, and so forth - all be left disabled).

Some common scripts across many popular websites are even considered malicious, although not necessarily "evil" so much as deeply intrusive and privacy-violating. Media company websites are notorious for employing incredibly intrusive third party scripts.

The downside with NoScript is that it will initially block absolutely everything. So you'll have to selectively enable the harmless scripts upon your first visit to each website. But for those folks who are security conscious, NoScript is a must-have. It helps to significantly reduce (but not eliminate) the active threat surface area of all websites.

 

[koleszar]

For technically proficient people who have the option to install third party browser extensions or plugins, if you want to have extremely fine-grained control over what happens "automatically" on all websites, you can install the NoScript extension.

That extension will initially blacklist every script on every website by default. You then can selectively permit various scripts to run while leaving others blocked.

You also get to see just how many third party scripts are included on many popular websites. Many of those scripts have no value at all to site visitors (they collect information about you, or gather stats about your visit bundled and sold to big data companies, and so forth - all be left disabled).

Some common scripts across many popular websites are even considered malicious, although not necessarily "evil" so much as deeply intrusive and privacy-violating. Media company websites are notorious for employing incredibly intrusive third party scripts.

The downside with NoScript is that it will initially block absolutely everything. So you'll have to selectively enable the harmless scripts upon your first visit to each website. But for those folks who are security conscious, NoScript is a must-have. It helps to significantly reduce (but not eliminate) the active threat surface area of all websites.

And for those not technically proficient, a piece of painter's tape over the upper right side of the screen does the trick. 😁

 

[mildone]

And for those not technically proficient, a piece of painter's tape over the upper right side of the screen does the trick. 😁

True, that works and has the advantage of extreme simplicity.

But doing that also hides from view all the digits disappearing from your investment accounts after some evildoer has captured your account credentials using one of many script hacks always circulating out there, and has initiated a bunch of transfers to their accounts.

Of course, no browser plugin can help when, instead of website scripts capturing your account credentials, users fall prey to devious and clever social engineering hacks from certain well-known brilliant credential scroungers out there (@RutgersRaRa).

 

[retired711]

For technically proficient people who have the option to install third party browser extensions or plugins, if you want to have extremely fine-grained control over what happens "automatically" on all websites, you can install the NoScript extension.

That extension will initially blacklist every script on every website by default. You then can selectively permit various scripts to run while leaving others blocked.

You also get to see just how many third party scripts are included on many popular websites. Many of those scripts have no value at all to site visitors (they collect information about you, or gather stats about your visit bundled and sold to big data companies, and so forth - all be left disabled).

Some common scripts across many popular websites are even considered malicious, although not necessarily "evil" so much as deeply intrusive and privacy-violating. Media company websites are notorious for employing incredibly intrusive third party scripts.

The downside with NoScript is that it will initially block absolutely everything. So you'll have to selectively enable the harmless scripts upon your first visit to each website. But for those folks who are security conscious, NoScript is a must-have. It helps to significantly reduce (but not eliminate) the active threat surface area of all websites.

Perhaps this is simply my paranoia, but I am fearful of all extensions.

 

[mildone]

Perhaps this is simply my paranoia, but I am fearful of all extensions.

Being fearful of extensions is wise.

I've been using NoScript for a very long time. It's open source (on GitHub) so it's internals can be examined by anybody. I personally rate it not only safe to use, but one of the very few must have extensions for use in high-security contexts.

However, I'm guessing your internet use doesn't fall under the umbrella of high-security contexts. And there are always risks to using any extension. And I'm just some anonymous person on the internet, so caution makes sense.

Not to mention that many people don't want to have to deal with, or lack the expertise to be, going about whitelisting safe scripts while leaving unsafe or unnecessary scripts blocked.

I would NOT recommend using the internet to do online banking or finance without some form of ad-blocking extension(s), though. uBlock Origin is a another good one and is far easier for typical internet users to deal with than NoScript.

 

[DJ Spanky]

I would NOT recommend using the internet to do online banking or finance

What about sending my bank account information to Nigerian princes?

 

[RUScrew85]

I use Firefox for this site and don't see them. Or maybe it's Ad Block that's doing it. Doesn't matter as I hate seeing them.

I think there's a setting to prohib startup vids in FF.

 

[RutgersRaRa]

True, that works and has the advantage of extreme simplicity.

But doing that also hides from view all the digits disappearing from your investment accounts after some evildoer has captured your account credentials using one of many script hacks always circulating out there, and has initiated a bunch of transfers to their accounts.

Of course, no browser plugin can help when, instead of website scripts capturing your account credentials, users fall prey to devious and clever social engineering hacks from certain well-known brilliant credential scroungers out there (@RutgersRaRa).

RutgersRaRa is a decent and honest man, and if you have any doubts about that just check the deep dark web--you won't even find me there. Or any of my research.

 

[retired711]

I would NOT recommend using the internet to do online banking or finance without some form of ad-blocking extension(s), though. uBlock Origin is a another good one and is far easier for typical internet users to deal with than NoScript.

Dumb question: why not?

 

[mildone]

What about sending my bank account information to Nigerian princes?

Not a problem. But only a Nigerian prince.

 

[koleszar]

True, that works and has the advantage of extreme simplicity.

But doing that also hides from view all the digits disappearing from your investment accounts after some evildoer has captured your account credentials using one of many script hacks always circulating out there, and has initiated a bunch of transfers to their accounts.

Of course, no browser plugin can help when, instead of website scripts capturing your account credentials, users fall prey to devious and clever social engineering hacks from certain well-known brilliant credential scroungers out there (@RutgersRaRa).

Never underestimate the power of duct tape and bailing wire, they're must haves on the farm. If I wrap it tight enough around my computer, no one can get in.

 

[mildone]

Dumb question: why not?

Not a dumb question at all.

Ad scripts are a common malware vector. Ad blockers prevent those scripts from running, which in turn reduces the attack surface for malware.

More detailed non-technical explanation...

First, note that it's typically not the website you're visiting that's behaving maliciously. For example, if you visit the ABC news website, ABC is not out to harm you. But they ARE out to profit from your visit. So they typically host a bunch of ads and data-gathering scripts.

But ABC and most of the other popular websites you visit usually use third-party scripts to present ads and gather information about you. A third-party script is some Javascript that is hosted on a website somewhere other than the one you're visiting. Those third-party scripts are injected into your browser as part of the site you're visiting. (This is normal and happens all the time.)

The problem is, the site you're visiting may not be able to ensure that the scripts coming in from third party websites are uncorrupted and/or non-malicious. They don't always have a good way to know that they're allowing malicious code to run in their visitor's browsers.

Depending on context, malware encoded into ad scripts can do all sorts of nasty stuff within your browser. One of the more scary attacks works by putting up a facade that looks identical to the real website, but is in fact capturing and forwarding all your interaction (keyboard input, mouse clicks, etc.) to some evil web server. Users have no clue that's happening.

Imagine that, after being hacked, your financial institution's website is presenting a facade that looks exactly like their website, but instead of communicating to your institution's web server, your account credentials are scooping up and forwarded to some server on the dark web, where that information is packaged and sold.

Browsers nowadays can do a lot to prevent that sort of thing (such hacks used to be almost child's play). And financial institutions have some really good security these days. But it's just not technically possible for browsers to prevent every type of hack without fully disabling Javascript (and some other browser features).

So ad-blockers, NoScript, and multifactor authentication are all methods one can use to safeguard themselves as best as possible.

 

[mildone]

Never underestimate the power of duct tape and bailing wire, they're must haves on the farm. If I wrap it tight enough around my computer, no one can get in.

For me, duct tape was a parent's best friend.

Like most parents, from time to time, I would give my kids relatively short timeouts as a gentle punishment for bad behavior. But I'm A.D.D. and would forget all about it. About an hour later, I'd hear a little voice calling me "dad..." and be like, oh shit, I forgot.

Couldn't keep doing that. So in an effort to be a much better parent, I instead starting duct taping them to the ceilings. That way, you see, gravity served as the timer. And, as a bonus feature, when the timeout timed out, the nine foot drop to the hardwood floor would serve as a nice little reminder to them to behave next time.

My kids are all adults now. And they are extremely well-behaved. 🙂

 

[Bagarocks]

Much prefer Firefox over Chrome

I use Brave