[jacquesm]

Bad move by google, really. Start on a button click is one thing but auto-starting something that makes a bunch of noise on a page that has always been totally silent is really dumb.

[studer]

Google doesn't autostart anything, it's a FireFox extension (Cool Previews) that loads the page in the background that causes the trouble. I suggest reading up on the real story before you start labeling things as "bad moves" and "really dumb".

[follower]

Actually, the sound does autostart when you load the page. But the playing sound in the background issue is related to the extension.

[jacquesm]

My browser is 'clean', there are no extensions or plug-ins installed besides the 'closed tabs button' and greasemonkey.

Welcome to HN by the way.