Dropbox full because of shared folder

[Michele A.]

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 uses the free space of my account without cancelling those folder?
Because i have no more space and i haven't uploaded any files

Excuse me for my english but i found problem on trying to traduce this message from my language

[Full C.]

Yeah, this is pretty terrible, what's the point in buying a TB of space if we can't share it with any clients without it also costing them per month. That's incredibly unfriendly, bit disappointed to find this out.

They claim that it's to stop stacking of free accounts for unlimited space? Well, only have it count against peoples quotas if the shared folder is created by a free account then?

Maybe instead of constantly using up bandwidth, just have it store the properties of the shared file and you have to download the meat of it when you want it.

Allow read only logins to a paid account (oh wait, business only, got to get more money).

Take the quota out of the holder of the shared account. We only currently share working folders with 2 clients, we could easily absorb that into our quota, they can't.

Any of these solutions which took all of 10 minutes to think up would be less offensive to front end users and not come off as just money grabby

[Mike M.15]

If the data is allocated to all users when the users are editors, why is the data not allocated to all users when users are "readers" only.  They still have access to the files, they can still download those files.  I think DB business model is not meant for sharing of files between users.  Their model was only designed for one user sharing data with themselves.

Google Drive and Microsoft One Drive are different and probably have their limitations too.  I for one don't care for the way Gdrive takes control over your photos so most likely I am going to try out One Drive if DB doesn't give me any more space so I can share photos between my family members.

For those users that upload their phone/PC data for backup purposes or to share the odd photo albums back and forth, DB is NOT the program for you. 

[Richard P.]

Mike, if you use a shared folder, the effect is same regardless of the permissions of the people accepting the shared folder invites.

A shared link on the other hand is divorced from a recipients Dropbox account, and infact you dont even need a Dropbox account to access one, so there is nothing to allocate space from.

Shared folders get you the benefit of updates being synced, previous versions being available and a number of other things - shared links give you a one time view.

[Rich]

why is the data not allocated to all users when users are "readers" only. 

In a shared folder, it is. The level of access you have to a shared folder doesn't matter. If a shared folder is in your account, even if you have view-only access, it counts against your storage quota (Business Teams are the exception to this).

For share links, which is a type of read-only sharing that doesn't require a Dropbox account, the data is not counted against you because the data doesn't reside in your account (assuming you have a Dropbox account, since one isn't needed for a link). You're just accessing a link to that data that allows you to view and/or download.

Edit: Ninja'd by Richard.

[Charles S.10]

First time I've had this issue and dbox is pretty much dead/locked up - have the 2tb plan and have used less than 500gb - problem is with the Local hard drive - had been set up on Drive C but that was getting full so bought a new 5TB external HD - have a few progs on there, etc but right now it says there are 2.6TB free space - yet DB says it can't download any cloud files as the local/computer disk is "full" - what gives?  And yes, did change the d/l location to the new drive and all worked well for say 6 months - now getting this new issue

[Andreas G.17]

The same issue affected me as well. I bought the premium account, uploaded 200GB of personal photos, created an additional free account for my wife and expected that i could share the files with her so she could sometimes view them on her phone.

FYI.... i migrated over from google drive as i much prefer dropbox's linux/android/windows apps but this is a big let down thb...

[Charles S.10]

I have a 5TB drive on each of two computers that are to sync - no problem with the other one except that DB doesn't want to work at all (syncing) but no "drive full" issues - have had DB for years now and no issues, all working fine - now having issues on both main computers that are supposed to be synced (but they're not) so having to look at other options such as Sync and Amazon- would prefer to keep DB but having to spend an inordinate amount of time TRYING to get it working via multiple remove/re-installs, etc ad nauseum - lots of wasted time and Amz's plan for unlimited images is only $12/year so think I'll try that for images and their other plan or Sync for other file types - maybe DB will miraculously fix itself before I make the jump

[Gerald Y.1]

If Dropbox is going to double charge, triple charge, quadruple charge, they should charge much less per MB.

One problem is that there is no control on the usage of the purchased space.  Many people don't count the bytes too well, and many people can't keep track of what's in their folders.  We all have friends like that.  Some of us are like that, at least sometimes.  They share a folder with many people and then upload hundreds of megabytes of files that are irrelevant to a majority of the shared people.  It's the convenient thing to do.  But unknowingly, they are all counted as fee for all of the shared friends.

I should be charged only on the space I actually use, manageable by me.  I don't want to inadvertently charge my friends' accounts because Dropbox double, triple, quadruple charge.

Instead, Dropbox uses a dishonest and sleazy way to over-charge.

Dropbox is NOT suitable for sharing files.

[Gerald Y.1]

When you receive the “Your Dropbox is full” e-mail, you can unsubscribe from these notifications.  And in the future share your files using other means.

[Gerald Y.1]

Dave, Mark Mc, Alexis G and Rich R have made it very clear that Dropbox doesn’t care what the users think.  They will use their unique way of counting to charge, and they think that is correct.  They think Dropbox have spent a lot of cost and effort to set up the service and they won’t be listening to the users’ honest feedback, and Dropbox won’t be able to do anything about it.  Dropbox doesn’t charge by ownership space.  Instead they charge by happenstance unrequested accessibility.  Rigid, uninventive and unconcerned about users’ feedback is what they try to convey.  We should understand their statements and accept that is Dropbox.

They are however very imaginative in creating explanations on how Dropbox should multi-charge on each shared file that has just one copy on their server.