Forum Moderators: phranque
They slow things dwon also, well the ones I have come across. It makes me think of tacky.
IMHO
Agree. I give away the speakers that come on any PC we have and/or mute the sound card.
They also make sites dog-slow, as mentioned above.
A possible exception: if the point of the particular page is to present a piece of music, so that your users may even expect the music to automatically play, then you are not "springing it on them." (Example: a site, or section of a site, devoted to providing hymn tunes & lyrics.)
But even here autoplay is not required. Some users would prefer to make their own choice about whether to play the music (e.g., some may be there only to read the lyrics).
In any case, provide an obvious way for people to turn it off!
users would prefer to make their own choice about whether to play the music
I think that says it best.
That goes for flash too! On a home PC it's not so bad but in a busy quiet office having music thrust upon you is just suicidal in terms of revisits and is a diciplinary offence in some offices I have had the pleasure to work in ;)
It's actually been used extremely effectively (a couple of film websites and Massive Attacks old site spring to mind) but the designers of those sites didn't need to ask whether it was ok.
To pull something like that off without being tacky/just-plain-nasty you really need to be sh*t hot and know exactly what you're doing.
And even then it's risky.
TJ
People's musical tastes are so different. Your favourite music is someone else's pet hate.
That is the whole problem summed up in one sentence. You will drive some of your visitors to make an early exit.
Plus the whole slow loading issue.
I had an MP3 play in the background (the page loaded with an M3U, with a link to the MP3 inside), but it strained bandwith like crazy.
-panic
What Yidaki said. Just more.
I'm with Sinner_G on this one for sure :)
Many people surf whilst playing other music, and boy can that sound awful when you surf to a dodgy page! Lots of homepages with music are breaking somebody's copyright anyway.
Websites should not make sound unless you are sampling a sound for a purchase or specific entertainment/education of some kind.
Even then, you probably shouldn't have it as background music :P
-p
Especially when you listen to something else at a low volume and bg music pops up real loud overtaking the whole house while everyone is sleeping
That also holds true for Flash banner ads with audio. I'd be listening to my CD audio extra low at work, and out of nowhere, you just hear Macho Man Randy Savage say "Buy my new CEEE-DEEEEE ... OOOOHHHHHH YEEEEAAAAHHHH" at full blast.
Needless to say, calling it embarassing would be an understatement.
I think audio shouldn't play unless there's a user action that causes the audio to play (i.e. a button that says "Click here to play audio")... but that's just me :P
-p
If i hear a midi sound at a web page i close it immediately. Seriously. No second visit.
Very annoying if you're one of those rare people that surf at work. :)
Especially when its added to blinking text and java storms.
Throw in a disabled back button and I am in hog heaven!
(although flash site for max payne 2 is really cool)
Every web page should have embedded midi - people are just chicken.nothing quite beats a heavily quantised piano sonata.
