Professor Stolfi,
Is this
the Bitcoin Rain scam people, or another Brazilian bitcoin rain??
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LIX1ot9peIIs this really an IBM thing? Seems too amateurish? Cloud buzzword overload. Strange comments from illuminatiman.
Generally, what the hell is this
No it is not the same thing. IBM made a marketing gaffe using that name, but few people knew of the former Bitcoin Rain. (By chance I was in that Campus Party event, for a panel on copyright stuff, and saw the preparations for that stunt. But I had to leave before it actually happened. It was there that I saw the first and so far only bitcoiner in person: a young fellow with a "bitcoin" T-shirt. I carefully stayed out of his way.
)
The Bitcoin Rain I was refering to was a bitcoin "investment fund" run by the same person who created the MercadoBitcoin exchange, back in 2011 or 2012. It promised 10% profit *per month*, and collected several thousand BTC from Brazilian investors. Of course it was a ponzi. When one client requested to withdraw his ~1000 BTC, MercadoBitcoin (where the coins were kept) was promptly hacked and "sorry for your loss folks".
As in most other bitcoin scams, the victims could not do anything concrete. The creator then sold MercadoBitcoin, and the new owners obviously claimed that they were not responsible for Bitcoin Rain. I only learned of that after I started following bitcoin, in late 2013 or early 2014.
EDIT:
original announcement of the Bitcoin Rain ponzi on this forum:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=46750.0A victim's tale (in Portuguese)
http://defendaseudinheiro.com.br/a-verdadeira-historia-do-mercadobitcoinNespaper article (in Portuguese):
http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/tec/2013/05/1276947-bitcoin-da-prejuizo-e-lucro-reais-a-usuarios.shtml