Bitcoin digital wallet and payment processor Coinbase has announced a unique bitcoin giveaway aimed at college students.The company says it is handing out $10-worth of bitcoin to students who create a new Coinbase account using approved .edu email addresses.The giveaway kicked off a few days ago and Coinbase says interest is "impressive".The company published a leaderboard on its blog, featuring the most popular university domains so far: University of Illinois is in the lead, with 496 students signing up using illinois.edu email addresses.Bitcoin loving Texans rank second, with 290 signups originating from utexas.edu email addresses.California’s Berkeley University came in third with 232 signups.Coinbase is asking users to tweet or share the blog post, which includes simple step-by-step instructions and terms of service.This is a limited time offer, but Coinbase is not saying how long it plans to keep going.The offer is good only for one customer and one access device.Recipients will not be eligible for referral bonuses provided in other Coinbase promotions.

Furthermore, interested participants should be aware that not every .edu domain is covered by the terms of offer.“We have tried to include the top 500 universities worldwide (this is not US focused) but we can’t guarantee all universities are supported.We may also disable certain universities where we see abuse,” said Coinbase.Of course, those new to Coinbase are encouraged to sign up – and tell their friends.In offering this giveaway, CoinBase said it was inspired by a project launched by two MIT students, under which all 4,500 undergraduates at MIT will receive $100 worth of bitcoin.The original idea came from the MIT Bitcoin Club, more specifically members Dan Elitzer and Jeremy Rubin.However, Elitzer and Rubin do not intend to hand out bitcoins for nothing.This is a serious, $500,000 research project, aimed to use the giveaway as a huge cryptocurrency experiment and foster further research and entrepreneurial activity.With $100 worth of free bitcoin at their disposal, students have a good incentive to take part once the programme launches this fall.

The Coinbase giveaway is not as ambitious, but it will encompass more students and hopefully encourage more people into the world of digital currencies.Mortar board image via Shutterstock The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is an independent media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies.The giveaway is intended to promote a bitcoin ecosystem across campus when students return in the autumn Each student will get around a quarter of a bitcoin to do whatever they want with.bitcoin 100 72 millionPhotograph: Rick Bowmer/AP The giveaway is intended to promote a bitcoin ecosystem across campus when students return in the autumn Undergraduates at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology will be given $100 (£59) worth of bitcoins when they return to study this autumn, in an attempt to jumpstart a bitcoin ecosystem.tao bitcoin

The project is being led by Jeremy Rubin, 19, an undergraduate in his second year at the university, and Daniel Elitzer, an MBA student at MIT's Sloan School of Management.Between them, the pair have raised more than $500,000, principally from Alexander Morcos, an MIT alum who works in high-frequency trading in New York."We decided to announce this project now to give students lead time," says Elitzer.ethereum daily analysis"We want to issue a challenge to some of the brightest technical minds of a generation: ‘When you step on to campus this fall, all of your classmates are going to have access to bitcoin; what are you going to build to give them interesting ways to use it?'" "Giving students access to cryptocurrencies is analogous to providing them with internet access at the dawn of the internet era," adds Rubin.bitcoin in tampaBoth Rubin and Elitzer have prior experience with bitcoin.bitcoin daily beast

The former is the developer of Tidbit, a project to replace online advertising with bitcoin mining, while the latter is the president and founder of MIT's Bitcoin Club.Created in a hackathon in November 2013, Tidbit was proof-of-concept that would let website owners mine bitcoins on visitors' computers rather than show them adverts.The project ran into difficulty when it was targeted by the New Jersey division of consumer affairs, and Rubin is currently being supported by the EFF, the online-rights charity.bitcoin identity confirmation codeRubin and Elitzer first met in the fallout of the Tidbit subpoena, and while the concept of the giveaway was initially Rubin's idea, the pair expanded it together."I am not super involved in the Bitcoin community," says Rubin, "but it is one of the subjects which I frequently think about.Dan has many more ties in the community."Speaking to the Tech, MIT's student newspaper, the university's head of undergraduate education, Dennis Freeman, supported the bitcoin giveaway.

"By bringing students and faculty together to inform members of the MIT community about what bitcoin is and to research its use, Rubin and Elitzer are helping everyone to better understand this emerging technology."Rubin and Elitzer's plan echoes other giveaways common across the bitcoin community.In April 2013, a user on Reddit calling themselves the "Bitcoin Billionaire" gave away over $13,000 in the currency, using a function on the site that lets users "tip" each other in bitcoin.Normally, the tips are for around 50¢, but the anonymous user was giving away up to 20 bitcoin at once.At the time, bitcoin was worth around $200 a coin, making that single gift the equivalent of $4000.In many cases, the aim is similar to Rubin and Elitzer's: if more people own bitcoin, there is more chance that the currency will reach a critical mass where it will be able to support itself.But for the MIT Bitcoin Club, there's the additional benefit that making bitcoin popular in the middle of one of the highest concentrations of hackers, coders and engineers in the world could be key to building up infrastructure for the cryptocurrency.