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Forum Discussion
Dropbox full because of shared folder
Hi, i have a dropbox account and the free space that i have is full because of the files inside the shared folder that i have with some friends.
Is there a way to avoid that the shared folder that ...
Your English is very good Michele - well done!
And no, if you need read write access to that folder if will use your quota. If you just need read only access leave the share and ask the other person sends you a read only Shared link.
You can LEAVE and REJOIN a shared folder when ever you like.
So one method of getting space is to LEAVE the shared folder. And REJOIN it when you need it.
If you ONLY need some files from the shared folder and ONLY at some times, I would additionally ask the owner of the shared folder for a LINK to it, in that way you can use the link to it and download via web the files you need when you need them.
Although I don't agree with Dropbox, and this is the primary reason I won't spring for Pro, I understand why they did this.
It's simple, really. Say, someone creates 10 free accounts. 10 x 2GB = 20GB. Now, that person, from each account shares a folder with his main account. That person just got more, free, space.
@AlexG
You are correct that DB's costs include more than storage costs - they also include connectivity costs.
However, when you stated the following was not true:
But this is not how they charge for the service - DB charges by space, not by access or downloads.
You were wrong. DB only charges its customers for space - it does not charge for connectivity. Try downloading a big file loads of times and see if you get charged more. You won't.
It is also true that, until October last year, Db did not own their own network for data storage and connectivity - it was all provided by Amazon. This changed last October when they switched to their own storage network, after a two year project to design and build their own network.
See this blog post for details: https://blogs.dropbox.com/tech/2016/03/magic-pocket-infrastructure/
Their charging structure is older than that though, so the sob story about all their expensive networking kit doesn't really apply, because for most of DB's life they've not needed to buy much of this.
Even their own service is not consistent with this view. You can share a file, even from a free account, that can be downloaded by anyone, with or without an account, as often as they like.
For example, I just added NOOBs V1.8 (for the Raspberry Pi) to my account. It weighs in at just over 1GB. Anyone can download it for free, even if they are not a DB customer.
It's a little ironic - uploads to most services that charge for bandwidth are free, while downloads cost. Yet, with DB, being able to upload to someone else's shared space costs you, but anyone can download as much as they like for free. How does that make sense?
@Mark Mc
The model all other cloud services I know of, where you pay for space and you can share it with others, but they don't have to pay for that privilege is transparent, and obvious.No, I mean successful, mainstream, popular services like Google Drive and Microsoft Onedrive. There, you can share as much as you like, and storage space is charged for once, by the owner of the folder.
Incidentally, many are cheaper than DB. Office 365 Family for example gives 5 people 1 TB space each, and the latest Microsoft Office, all for less than the cost of 1TB from DB.
You mean a lot of the other cloud services that have gone under? Copy.com for example.