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Renaming an account on LiveJournal is tricky. Because of this, it's going to cost you.

Contents 1 Limitations 2 Examples 3 Options 3.1 Activate redirects 3.2 Disable redirects 4 Rename to non-existant name 5 Rename to pre-existing name 6 Real examples

[edit] Limitations

• You can rename an account to a new name or an existing name.
• You can only rename an account to an existing name if:
  • The existing name has been deleted and purged, or
  • The existing name's account and the original account have the same registered and validated email address and the same password.

[edit] Examples

• old_and_busted_name: Name to rename from
• name_of_new_hotness: Name to rename to
• ex_name_of_new_hotness10: Username for name_of_new_hotness' old data

[edit] Options

The following options can only be set once. Once they are set, they cannot be changed.

• You can have the old name redirect to the new name, or you can sever the tie between the accounts.
  • If redirecting, the old name will automatically display the new name when used in an LJ User Tag
  • If not redirecting, the old name will appear in a deleted state

• You can keep your list of friends and memberships, or you can nuke them.
  • If kept, the new username will appear on your friends' and community's profile pages
  • If nuked, this will remove the old account from your friends' and community's profile pages and the new account will not be displayed

[edit] Activate redirects

• Any instance of <lj user="old_and_busted_name"> (abc) will automatically appear as name_of_new_hotness (abc)
• Any (or most) URL(s) will redirect from old_and_busted_name (abc) to name_of_new_hotness (abc)

[edit] Disable redirects

• Any instance of <lj user="old_and_busted_name"> will appear as old_and_busted_name.
• Any URL referencing old_and_busted_name will throw the deleted journal error

[edit] Rename to non-existant name

old_and_busted_name is renaming to name_of_new_hotness, which does not already exist. old_and_busted_name's userid is abc.

This can occur immediately.

[edit] Rename to pre-existing name

old_and_busted_name is renaming to name_of_new_hotness, which does already exist. old_and_busted_name's userid is abc. name_of_new_hotness' userid is xyz.

In order for LiveJournal to know that old_and_busted_name (abc) also owns name_of_new_hotness, both accounts must have the same registered and validated email address and the same password.

Once this is true, the rename can occur.

Since name_of_new_hotness already exists as userid xyz, the journal data is going to be moved. name_of_new_hotness' (xyz) data will be moved to ex_name_of_new_hotness10 where 10 is a random number.

After name_of_new_hotness' (xyz) data has been moved to ex_name_of_new_hotness_10, old_and_busted_name (abc) can rename and become name_of_new_hotness (abc).

[edit] Real examples

• mwilson activated redirects to matthew.
• 5213131 disabled redirects to mm1.