User blog comment:Brandon Rhea/How You Can Participate in FANDOM's Community Video Program/@comment-4091815-20171024211442/@comment-28083312-20171031135013

Advertisements are placed in front of the videos, like YouTube. At least that’s what I’ve gathered, since I have adblock out of necessity; I would not be able to effectively contribute to the network with the amount of ads there are combined with my new, slower, ISP.
 * …auto-play is a core function of the Featured Video product and can't be switched off universally…

It was turned off for non-English users. It does not strike me as a functional barrier, but as an intentional one.