Why is there music playing in gmail?
Contributed by David Kirk 
Tagged: Google Many, many people this morning have been wondering why music suddenly starts playing when gmail is opened. Well, it’s a bug for one of gmail’s new features. Here is how to stop the gmail carnival music.
I suspect this is a chrome / OS X bug. I’ve not been able to reproduce it in Firefox or Opera.
I ran through all my open tabs this morning trying to figure out from where the music was coming. After I closed every other tab, I realize that gmail had background music playing.
Actually, what is happening is that gmail is trying to show a youtube video of the new priority inbox feature. The video is suppose to autoplay to demonstrate the new service. However, many people are reporting that the video never comes visible and just the music plays over and over and over.
Click on the New! Priority Inbox Beta link to stop the music madness in gmail.
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Dave Atkins said on August 31, 2010
I’m glad I quickly found this blog post! I thought I had a virus. I verified the music only plays in Chrome and only on the gmail site, so I suspected some “clever” but intentional foul up.
David Kirk - Founder/Editor said on August 31, 2010
Glad it was helpful. Several people dropped me messages this morning wondering what was going on.
David Kirk - Founder/Editor said on August 31, 2010
I’ve updated the article to include a quick screencast showing the bug. A few users who were not seeing it live wanted to see what it looked (and sounded) like.
Masuimi said on August 31, 2010
Thank you for putting the riddle to rest. I had a couple of Chrome tabs open on some adult *ahem* websites and couldn’t quite figure out whether the music was from the sites themselves or if an incognito pop-ad was the culprit. Now I know!
Samantha L. said on August 31, 2010
What if we want it back? It was kind of nice.
Alan said on August 31, 2010
Oh my goodness that was way annoying!!!! I couldn’t figure out why Ubuntu kept wanting to kill an Adobe Flash script when I only had GMail open. And then the music started!!!! Oi! You think Google would have tested their new feature on Chrome of all browsers…..
Ray said on August 31, 2010
The problem is, even if you click the priority box, and select the “no thanks” button, it still keeps playing! I had to mute my speakers finally after panicking and waking up everyone in the house with the music. If my roommates leave any lasting scars on me…I’m suing google for damages.
To the guy watching porn when this happened…I am so very very sorry. That must have totally ruined the experience.
At least it’s a funnier bug of the possible bugs.
Laughzilla said on August 31, 2010
i’m using ubuntu and chrome. i let the video play. at the end of it, the ragtime music ended. :) still it’s weird that the music starts just like that without any clue as to why.
Davedub said on September 1, 2010
I thought I had a virus too, am very glad for this post!
Google have really dropped the ball with this one, has all the success finally gone to their heads? Have they lost the plot?
A stunt like this would suggest so!
onebeartoe said on September 1, 2010
Goodness I thought it was just me.