Avatars

Avatars appear to the left of a user's post, in their profile and are used to create individuality. These are custom LEGO Minifigures that users can create by clicking the 'Edit Profile' tab in the top right corner of LEGO.com. Avatars help other users to identify you easily. The Default Avatar is the avatar you first have on the MBs and LEGO.com until you edit or change it. On June 8th, 2011, in the Default Avatar Glitch, the default avatar was shown on all posts, even though the avatar on the edit profile page never changed. A similar thing happened in the Avatar X Glitch, where everyone's avatar showed as an X in Internet Explorer.

Combinations
Each avatar is composed of three different parts: Head, Torso, and Legs. There are currently 236 heads, 37 torsos, and 31 legs. This can be verified by looking at the source code on the Edit Profile page. This leads to a total 270,692 combinations of an avatar. (236 x 37 x 31) This may seem like a very large number, but the fact that there are over 2 million users on the Message Boards literally guarantees that not every user has a different avatar. This is why it's unreasonable to think someone copied your avatar. Most newbies don't change their avatar, specifically if they don't stay for more than a couple of days. Some people don't change their avatar at all, even if they are very active and post a lot (For Example, Rock-o-Ages)!