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The sun sets on Dropbox’s Mailbox and Carousel apps
Dropbox Inc.’s goal of expanding beyond its primary role as a file and data-sharing tool has ended with the company’s announcement that it will shut down its Carousel and Mailbox apps. The reason for the shutdown is so the company can focus more on their Dropbox collaboration and sharing features. Not surprising, considering that both the Carousel and Mailbox services have achieved little success and has seen minimal development in recent months.
“Building new products is about learning as much as it’s about making. It’s also about tough choices. Over the past few months, we’ve increased our team’s focus on collaboration and simplifying the way people work together. In light of that, we’ve made the difficult decision to shut down Carousel and Mailbox,” said Dropbox’s founder/CEO Drew Houston and CTO Arash Ferdowsi in a blog post.
Dropbox acquired Mailbox back in 2013 for $100 million. An Android app soon followed, and a Mac app was launched in 2014, but since then development seemed to cease. While development was being abandoned on the Mailbox app, other email competitors like Google Inbox and Microsoft Outlook mobile apps built on some of the unique features which were pioneered by Mailbox. Mailbox was one of the first email apps to introduce swipe functionality for emails and time management features like the ability to “snooze” emails. As part of the shutdown, Mailbox co-founders, Scott Cannon and Gentry Underwood, will be leaving Dropbox; however, Cannon will remain an adviser.
Carousel, a standalone photo management app, launched in 2014 but saw stiff competition from the likes of Apple Photos and Google Photos. The company has said it will carry over some of Carousel’s better features into the main Dropbox app.
The Mailbox app will end on February 26, with the Carousel app following in its footsteps a month later on March 31. Dropbox will be providing Carousel users with an export tool early next year to assist in the moving of shared albums and conversations. The company will also help Mailbox users migrate over to other email services.
Image credit: Aquilatin; Pixabay
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