A little more than a week ago, the rapper and entrepreneur Sean Combs, a.k.a. P. Diddy, released a video on YouTube in which he announced that due to the high cost of fuel, he would be swearing off the use of his private jet.

That alone was enough to get the attention of gossip columnists and bloggers who got a good chuckle at the high rolling P. Diddy forced to join the hoi polloi flying commercially. But after it emerged that Combs was the owner of a NetJets fractional share, the blogosphere really took him to task. Sites like Gawker asked, “Is it proper to call a NetJets membership ‘My Jet?’” Hamilton Nolan at Gawker delivered a harsh verdict when he wrote, “That’s not your jet, Puffy. Or if it is, the taxi I rode in is ‘my car.’” To claim you own a jet while flying fractionally is akin to “fronting” according to Gawker.

Now, as a veteran of the rap game, P. Diddy hardly needs our help to brush off the haters, so to speak. However, it pains us to see fractional ownership programs like NetJets so misunderstood in the popular press. NetJets owners are not purchasing time aboard an aircraft, as some suggest. Instead fractional jet holders are the legal owners of a portion of an aircraft, which is then leased back to the fractional company who manages the plane and regulates its use.

Ownership of the share and the terms of the lease entitle the NetJets share owner to a number of hours per year aboard that plane. The beauty of fractional jet programs is that even though P. Diddy may share his plane with as many as 16 other owners depending on the size of his fraction, he will always have guaranteed access to a private jet within a call-out window of a few hours. In fact, the terms of the lease exchange with NetJets gives an owner access to any type of plane within the NetJets fleet. After a typical five year period, owners then sell their share back to the fractional jet company.

The taxi cab analogy is particularly frustrating. Perhaps it would have been apt had it emerged that Diddy used on-demand charter for his travel. However, Diddy is indeed a legal, titled, owner of a jet without the hassles of managing the aircraft. In fact, all of the assorted hassles of plane ownership—hangaring the jet, plane maintenance, and hiring pilots and crew—are handled by NetJets. Unless Diddy flies more than 400 hours per year, it’s unlikely that he would see any additional benefit from owning an entire aircraft.

So keep your head up, Diddy. We stand by your claim to owning a private jet.

For additional information on fractional jet ownership, and whether it might be right for your flying needs, download our comprehensive guide.