I really love Dropbox Paper, so I get part of the collaboration story.
What I don't like is that it's so hard to share a file, or to send an image in a chat -- all paths lead to dropbox links instead. When I get a Dropbox link on mobile chat now, I know it's going to take nearly a minute to see the content. Why?
They probably think of it in terms of control. One of their big upsells is controlling access to shares. They don't see it as a problem that you have to save it to the device then share from that because it's not for you from their perspective. It's for people sending project assets to collaborators.
I think it makes a lot sense for the dropbox link to be the default, especially on mobile.
I almost never want to download the file over LTE to my smartphone and re-upload it to a different web service and waste (2 * filesize) of my limited mobile bandwidth to share a file.
Oh, yes, Dropbox links. I started telling my coworkers that if they share a file via dropbox, I will not even try to open it. The experience is so abysmal (the wait, then their ridiculous interface that turns a PDF into a buggy JavaScript application), that I don't even try to click on those links anymore.
What I don't like is that it's so hard to share a file, or to send an image in a chat -- all paths lead to dropbox links instead. When I get a Dropbox link on mobile chat now, I know it's going to take nearly a minute to see the content. Why?