P. Diddy opens polling company

NEW YORK -- It turns out the "P" in P. Diddy stands for "public opinion."

The hip-hop entrepreneur has expanded into the polling business with his own market research company.

Each week, the Sean "Puffy" Combs-owned company will release a national survey on a different topic. The poll debuted last week with a survey on the national economy. This week's was Sept. 11-related (and Combs was one of those surveyed).

"He's involved from a visionary standpoint," said Jameel Spencer, president of Blue Mindset, about his partner Puffy. "He saw the need to establish a company like this. It's definitely his vision."

Blue Mindset is a division of Combs' Blue Flame Marketing and Advertising, and it will target residents of "urban America" for its polling.

According to Spencer, that group is not defined by race or age or address, but by feel. "The coolest kid in the class in Wichita, Kan., is urban," Spencer explained.

Combs, 32, already owns his own record label, a clothing line and two restaurants. Besides being a hip-hop star himself, he's started an acting career. Combs' enterprises do an estimated $300 million in annual business, and Fortune magazine once estimated his annual earnings at more than $50 million.

But this is new ground for Combs, stepping away from the entertainment world to the world of the Pew Research Center and the Gallup Poll.

Spencer said the new operation was in keeping with Combs' "entrepreneurial spirit."