Apple’s iPhone or Cisco’s iPhone ? IConfused.

A few weeks back, the iPhone – a family of Voice-Over-IP (VoIP) devices – was unveiled by Cisco. This likely disappointed almost all the Mac cult-like followers who -as difficult as it may seem to beat the iPod’s success – were hoping that it will be Apple that came up with a new state of the art phone and called it the iPhone.

Earlier this week, at the MacWorld Expo here in San Francisco, Steve Jobs unveiled another iPhone. This one was a real phone, and it seems so far ahead of its time that critics are saying it is will likely send smartphone manufacturers such as Nokia, Samsung, Motorola scrambling to compete with Apple before they lose all their market share to this iPhone.

What confused me until late last night was who owned the copyrights and trademarks on iPhone ? Was it Cisco or was it Apple ? In the lawsuit capital of the world, I was wondering if we were going to see another slew of suits over the name iPhone ?

My confusion is already getting cleared by the Media slowly. Cisco has just claimed ownership of ‘IPhone’. and slapped a lawsuit on top of the claim.

Let the drama begin !