desh | (no subject)

I just changed my AIM screenname. I had the old one for about 9 years. It feels so weird, like I've changed my legal name or something. This will take me months to get used to. But the old name was tied to an AOL account, so it'll go away when my mom eventually cancels AOL. The change had to be done, but man, it's sad.

(I'm not going to say what my screenname is in a public entry. If you knew the old one, check its away message.)

EDIT: Maybe not. Does anyone know anything about what happens to AIM screennames tied to canceled accounts? I'm trying to figure this out, and having trouble. If you canceled your AOL account at some point, when did you cancel, and did your screenname still work after? And did your screenname still work 6 months later? (I've heard that the 6-month mark is magical somehow for this sort of thing.) Please comment!

EDIT AGAIN: FALSE ALARM. I just called AOL, and they confirmed that you can keep your screenname. So I won't be changing, or at least not now. I still want to hear from y'all, though, because I don't think AOL's above lying to me if they think it's good for business. What happened when you canceled AOL?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

you can keep the aim name once the aol account is cancelled...

Are you sure? I've heard you can't, as of a couple years ago. Some googling seemed to confirm that. But if you have sources or anecdotes, throw them at me, please.

All of my family's (including mine) AOL screen names still work on AIM, years after canceling AOL. I don't remember if there was something we did or clicked to make that work, but they most certainly still have the same ones.

The "years after canceling AOL" is the key. I think they only disable AIM for accounts cancelled after...2003, I'd guess? I'm not sure. When did your family cancel?

Uh, probably sometime in early 2003, actually.

Yeah, all of mine were tied to my aol account, which only bit the dust earlier this year.

Hmm. It looks like they may have changed the policy back in May of this year. Trying to make their AIM branding more like Yahoo, with free IMing and webmail. Still looking into it...