Sean John Combs always seems to inhabit the hip-hop world relatively confidently, yet he has changed his stage name so often that you could easily accuse the man of suffering from multiple personality disorder (or at least being sort of fickle). The rapper, producer, actor, writer, television mogul, restaurateur and clothing designer has worked through number of monikers, and on this day in 2005, he changed his name again to the name we know him as today: Diddy.
Back when he first founded Bad Boy Records and broke into the music business as the Notorious B.I.G.'s producer, he was known as Sean "Puffy" Combs (a nickname he picked up as an undersized high school football player who used to "puff up" his chest to make himself seem bigger). As the Bad Boy empire grew to include his own albums as well as those by Mase, Lil Kim, Junior M.A.F.I.A. and others, he became known as Puff Daddy, the patriarch of the Bad Boy family. In 2001, he became known as P. Diddy for the release of his third album The Saga Continues..., a record that contained the track "Shiny Suit Man," an interlude that featured the rapper poking fun at his various monikers.
He continued on as P. Diddy until this day in 2005, when he went on NBC's "Today" to announce that he was dropping the "P" from his name and would be known simply as Diddy. That's the name he now records under, though he is usually credited on films as Sean Combs or Sean "Diddy" Combs. In the U.K. and Australia, he's still known as P. Diddy because of a lawsuit filed against him by Richard "Diddy" Dearlove, a London DJ who already had claim to the name.
No matter what we call him, he has become one of the most important icons in music and entertainment in the past two decades. In honor of Diddy, enjoy "Last Night," from his woefully underrated 2006 album Press Play.