True, though it's definitely nice to see how that discussion didn't descend into poo-flinging. The poster replied to the criticism and the critic conceded that it would indeed be useful, even for linux users :-)
Also it really shits me that every time I log in I get a little banner that says “Almost out of space? Try Dropbox Business!”.
One, no, I am not almost out of space. I’m at 15% and if you don’t know that, there’s something terribly wrong.
Two, I’m not a business. I’m just me. And I already pay for Pro. Get out of my goddamned face.
/rant
It’s not the devs. The owners likely become sufficiently detached from the end product and experience and sales/marketing teams are left to squeeze every bit of fiscal value from the thing. That usually results in battles for new analytics or new features that usually look like background software/network bloat, and judging the client to increase their spend no matter what. Those teams always have to post higher numbers regardless of the market.
Not that I disagree.
The forced ad, accidentally clicked, locked my account, had to spend an hour cleaning it up.
Probably got tests running to see what exactly keeps people around when they get onto the plan.
When you've got that many users, I think it becomes norm. I remember a funny story about how Google tested hundreds of shades of blue to see which exact shade lifted click through rates the most. The standard default blue won.
I can't agree that the impact on UX is worthwhile in the long run but I can see how such things can be attractive when you haven't got the, I dunno the right word for it, "clout" to look past the immediate bottom line like Amazon or Apple had when people were betting on them.