Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs’ assault allegations lead to drop in rapper’s streaming activity

The recent assault and harassment charges filed against Sean “Diddy’ Combs by the rapper’s then-long-time girlfriend and protégé, Casandra Ventura, or just commonly known as Cassie, has affected the rapper’s streaming activity immensely.

The hip-hop mogul’s U.S. catalog streams during the first week of December of 2023, just two weeks after Cassandra sued him, to the streams of his catalog during the week when the video footage of the rapper allegedly attacking Cassie was made public, has seen a major drop in the streams of his songs under the stage name Diddy. According to Luminate, a company that provides music and entertainment data, there was a 51.8 percent decrease for his songs, all the way up from 2,624,000 streams to 1,265,000 streams.

As Puff Daddy at the time, he experienced a comparable decline, with streams plummeting by 48.3 percent from 1,359,000 to 703,000.

The drop in the streaming numbers follows Combs' apology on Sunday for the resurfaced 2016 video, obtained by CNN, showing him assaulting Cassie. The singer recognized by her mononym in the R&B scene, was signed under Bad Boy Records, the label of her long-time partner. Their collaboration in 2006 yielded the popular track “Me & U,” and their romantic relationship lasted for more than ten years.

In the resurfaced video, Combs can be seen chasing after a woman, who appears to be Ventura. He then grabs her by the back of the neck, shoves her down the floor, kicks and stomps her, as he then drags her by her sweatshirt. A few moments later, the video shows Diddy returning to kick her again, and then also proceeding to hurl an object from a nearby table at her.