[DarkDeviL]

On Friday, December 16 2016 at 04:02 CET, I received the following email:

Originally Posted by Dropbox Email Hi <Your Name>, We’re always looking to improve the Dropbox sharing experience. The Public folder was the first sharing method we introduced, and since then, we’ve built even better ways for you to share securely and work together with your team. As a result, we’ll soon be ending support for the Public folder. Dropbox Basic users will be able to use the Public folder until March 15, 2017. After that date the files in your Public folder will become private, and links to these files will be deactivated. Your files will remain safe in Dropbox. If you’d like to keep sharing files in your Public folder, you can create new shared links. Just make sure to send the new URLs to your collaborators. In addition to shared links, we have a number of sharing options designed to make collaboration easier and give you more control. To learn more, visit our Help Center. The Dropbox team

This means if you are currently running your sv_downloadurl via your pre-June 2012 Dropbox account, using one of these two links:

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/{ID}/...
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/{ID}/...

Then your sv_downloadurl will break after March 15, 2017.

It might make sense for you to ensure that you are fully migrated away from the Dropbox URL before this date.


UPDATE May 2, 2017:

Paid accounts (e.g. Dropbox PLUS (1 TB)) seems to have an extended period until September 1, 2017 (not officially confirmed!).

[metal_upa]

Means this is the end of free public folder. Sad.. very sad..

[fysiks]

Probably because it was being abused by being used for fast download and other "file server" purposes which is not what dropbox was designed for.

[Timocop]

Just a side note: DO NOT use free webhosts for file storage! Some webhosts (e.g 000webhost) disallow filehosting-only in their Terms of Services.

[cravenge]

Good thing: Weirdos, with the exception of hackers, can't get our files now and that means they can't remake those files, post them in some sh*tty websites, and claiming it as their own.
Bad thing: Pretty much in the OP.

[psychonic]

Originally Posted by Timocop Just a side note: DO NOT use free webhosts for file storage! Some webhosts (e.g 000webhost) disallow filehosting-only in their Terms of Services.

I believe this usage was also against Dropbox's ToS as well.

[shavit]

just get yourself a cheap vps (i like digitalocean's debian >> arch linux with nginx), setup cloudflare to cache everything for 3 months and you'll be fine with speeds and bandwidth

[Nekoz]

Originally Posted by shavit just get yourself a cheap vps (i like digitalocean's debian >> arch linux with nginx), setup cloudflare to cache everything for 3 months and you'll be fine with speeds and bandwidth

That exactly wat im using for digitalocean $5 per month

[404UserNotFound]

I pay $20/month for a VPS with a 1TB HDD and I run my site, fastDL and servers from it. Bought a domain name from Namecheap for $11/year to boot.

It's not hard to find cheap solutions, people just *think* they need to be paying hundreds per month for a "good" setup.

[GrO]

Formally it's about ToS, but the real reason is MONEY.