Now that we have looked at the main economic concepts, we can answer the question we asked in section 1.4 "Summary" of module 1:
If free software is free, i.e. by definition, anybody can gain access to this software – possibly at no cost – how is it possible for computer scientists (and computer companies) to earn a living from programming free software? Can we trust that resources (money and people's time) will be spent in the future on its maintenance and development?