Dropbox users have access to the public folder which can be shared with the public using the link. However a recent email from dropbox states that they will say say good bye to public folders in new accounts starting July 31, 2012 in lieu of the sharing ability which was introduced in April this year. The email notes that existing accounts will be unaffected by this and will continue to work as today.
Official Email from Dropbox:
Hi Vijay,
We wanted to let our developers know about an upcoming change to the Public folder for all user accounts. In April, we launched the ability to share any file or folder in your Dropbox with a simple link. This new sharing mechanism is a more generalized, scalable way to support many of the same use cases as the Public folder.
After July 31, we will no longer create Public folders in any new Dropbox accounts. If your app depends on Public folders, we recommend switching to the /shares API call. Public folders in existing accounts, however, will continue to function as before.
Please email us at api-program@dropbox.com if you have any questions or concerns.
- Dropbox API Team
Dropbox employee Michael N. mentioned two reasons on the official Dropbox forum.
- The recent introduction of the share file or folder functionality in Dropbox which Dropbox favors over the public folder
- That most Dropbox users are not making use of the public folder at all
I am not a big fan of Public folder myself but I know a few people who are upset by this move as they use public folder to quickly post links to files in forums and blog posts. What do you think about this?
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