how do I change my AV's First Name?

Hey all... I want to change my Av's first name... Ive heard this can be done. How?

thanks!
MS

Names cannot be changed unless they they go against the TOS agreement. You have to created a new account.

You can have a custom name, but that cost you a $500 Setup fee plus the first annual $500 fee....

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Custom_Name_Program

The names can be changed (technically) easy... but they doesn't. First because anyone would then ask to change their name (and fill the customer support tasks), and even if they would do it by paying it would be a problem with the inventory items (if you reset the inventory then there would be no difference than creating a new account); especially with the no-transfer items, if they are no transfer they cannot be passed to another avatar name (it doesn't matter if it belongs to the same person) without the creator consensus (for a series of reasons, in example i would have a trace of item owners and if it's no-transfer im 100% sure that the item is owned by that person "forever"; neither LL (whenever they can do it) have the rights to do so. In other words, change your name or create a new account makes no difference atm (whenever i've heared about "friendly" cases where something different happened... but that's not the standard).

Your name is completely unconnected to your inventory. Everywhere you see a name in SL's UI it is actualy just a mask for the UUID.

Inventory is unaffected by name changes, as well as everything else, all the issues you bring up would occure if they changed your UUID of course though

Followup:

For example none of my objects are owned by "Dante Tucker" they are owned by ef69f1fd-915f-4494-a3b9-e285d8b3364b

So they give you the possibility to change your name into something personal, but it'll cost you enough to buy a car. Wow, anyone who actually did this?

that program is for NEW accounts. not for existing account.
And is ment for companies/organisations.

e.g. if you have a company called "blafoo"

you could signup for this program, so you through an registration api, can create accounts, with the surname "blafoo"

e.g. employee1 blafoo, micheal blafoo etc etc

There is also another programme, vanity..
this is for special situations, e.g. account for tv broadcast (rl), shows etc..
this costs 50USD setup and 50USD annualy.
but as stated, this is only for very special occassions..

to come short, once an account has been created, there is no way to change it to something else. (to technically sensitive for failures to do, for LL, because of the ID's etc)

This program is not for changing names. It allows a company or orginization to create accounts with custom last names. For example google could create "Googlonian" and make it availible to all of there employees to register with.

There is nothing that is dependent on names. names are irrelivent as far as the server and client is concerned. names are looked up via uuid any time they are needed to be displayed, and that is all they are used for, displaying something easier to understand then the uuid for the user.

Nope, since the official transaction (accessible by customers), in example, uses your name to identify an user/transaction, and not the UUID. So i wouldn't have a trace of "where" the object is actually if the customer decides to change his/her name, since it's not logged (it doesn't in any document accessible by customers). The UUID is used by the system, but unfortunately not everywhere.
I guess that also internally the database association (UUID > name) is not a single point, in fact they creates a new account, and in special case they migrates the contents (so the UUID will change), they doesn't just change your "alias" on the record.

All of which is very interesting, but the OP needs practical advice.

If you don't like your name, the time to change it is NOW, before you accumulate a lot of no-transfer inventory.

Sign up again for a new account. Take care picking your name. If you go to http://www.slnamewatch.com, it will give you a complete list of all the last names currently available (you only get a subset from the signup page...and a different one each time you log on).

Don't pick a name like "CrUdPupp1E5432". People have to type whatever you choose, you know. Pick something easy to type (even better if it has a short form. My friends call me Lin, which is quick and easy).

Pick one that feels good to you, and that describes you. For example, if you intend to use both male and female avatars, you might want a name that would work for either gender. If you plan to be a nonhuman, take that into consideration. I made an alt once called "Xanadu Fhang" merely because I wanted a better name for my dragon avatar than "Lindal Kidd".

Your name is about the only thing about yourself that you can't change...so take some time in choosing one you can live with long term.