Perhaps someone who understands patents better can explain this quote to me: "According to intellectual property activist Florian Mueller, Apple is unlikely to grant HTC a license for these patents and might make a damages claim."

My understanding was that a patent (unlike copyright, but like musical performances) was something you could not refuse to license, you could only extract a licensing fee. That being sort of the point of the inherent tradeoff of a patent—by making the blueprints public so anyone can use them, the gov't gives you a time-limited right to make money from anyone that uses that.

But the above quote would seem to contradict that. Can anyone explain?