Chosen username is reported as taken when it is not

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  • Updated 7 years ago
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I have just created a free account and would like to change my username to something more personal. When I input the one that I would like to use, IMDb tells me that it has already been taken, however when I go to http://www.imdb.com/user/[the name I chose] it returns a 404. Surely this username has, therefore, not been taken. What is going on?
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James Geddes

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Posted 7 years ago

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7 years ago
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Dan Dassow, Champion

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Once someone has used a name on IMDb, no one else can use that name again, even if that name is not currently being used. IMDb put this policy in place to discourage abusive users.

http://www.imdb.com/user [arbitrary text] is not a valid link and will produce a 404 page not found error. Instead links to user profile pages are for the form:
http://www.imdb.com/user/ur9999999/ [Note: this account does not exist and will produce a 404 page not found error.]

For instance, my user profile page is
http://www.imdb.com/user/ur0127678/

IMDb blocks search of user pages, so a Google search such as:
site:imdb.com/user will only provide the user name.

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