Misplaced Auto-playing ABC Video Clip (with No Pause Button) Diminishes the Value of the Story I Want to Read (and Recommend)

The video clip on this page does not match the story, and there does not seem to be any way to post from my blog to the print version of the article. Looks like a silly attempt to control web visitors, in such a way as to prop up ABC’s slice of the dwindling TV empire.

Though there’s a “play” button below the image, the clip plays automatically, and there doesn’t seem to be any way to pause it — clicking the play button again has no effect.

If playing the clip were optional, I could at least recommend that visitors ignore the clip (which is a puff piece about social-network gaming — old news to anyone who already does it, and tangential to the lives of anyone who doesn’t) and read the story instead. But the video starts automatically. It is possible to mute the story, but I shouldn’t have to do that just so I can concentrate on the story I came here to read.

The presence of the video clip actively diminishes the value of the of the story I want to recommend on my blog.

Forget fancy graphics, sprawling 3-D worlds and endless online connectivity. As underscored by recent Facebook updates of “The Oregon Trail” and “Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego,” all today’s gamer apparently wants is to party like it’s 1989.

Savor the irony. Previously, software makers were content to let classics like “Zork” and “Gabriel Knight” rot in obscurity, consigned to suspect “abandonware” sites, where doting fans made discontinued titles available for free download.

But suddenly, in an age where players have so many gaming choices available and so little time to choose between them, they’re finding solid gold in yesteryear’s hits.

via Retro Gaming: Yesterday’s Top Video Games Make Comeback – ABC News.