Slashdot reported over the weekend that Lulu, the print-on-demand service founded by Red Hat's Bob Young that has been an important resource for DRM-free and pro-sharing authors, is now selling DRM-infected ebooks.

Together, we have mostly defeated DRM on music. We now need to achieve the same victory with DRM and ebooks. We need to tell Lulu that DRM'ed ebooks are completely unacceptable. We will not let ebook publishers rob us of our right to share knowledge and ideas. With Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Sony continuing to push ebook DRM, we expect companies like Lulu to stand up for the public's freedom.

Lulu lets publishers of books and magazines sell physical and digital versions of their books, printed on demand, on lulu.com. The service has been popular with authors and publishers who are dissatisfied with (or excluded by) the conventional publishing industry -- the same industry that's pushing ebook DRM. Defective by Design is assembling a list of authors and publishers who will stop using Lulu's service (or who already have) due to their use of DRM. In the meantime, please contact Lulu and demand that they stop using DRM.

They can be contacted at orders@lulu.com and pr@lulu.com.

Sample text:

Dear Lulu,

Digg this!

The video game "Borderlands" was released for consoles on October 20. But when people who bought the PC version in stores went home to play it, they had a nasty surprise. Thanks to DRM, they couldn't install it until the official release date 6 days later.

We're calling on you to give the game a one-star rating on Amazon, tag the Amazon listing "defectivebydesign," and write a short note to the president of Gearbox Software, which makes Borderlands. When people add DRM to software, they are taking away users' rights. This couldn't be any clearer than in this case, where the people who own a copy of the game still can't play it until the company says they can.

There are three versions of Borderlands on Amazon. It would be great if you could rate and tag them all. If Defective By Design members come out on this, this will become a 1-star game.

(We don't want to encourage you to get an Amazon account if you don't already have one, as there are serious privacy concerns about how Amazon collects data from users, but if you do have an account, then here is a chance for you to use it for the benefit of others. Log in now, start searching and start tagging!)

1. To give Borderlands a one-star rating, visit the three product pages and look for the section "Rate This Item to Improve Your Recommendations."

• Version 1
• Version 2
• Version 3

2. JavaScript users can tag Borderland by pressing "tt" and entering the tag defectivebydesign. If JavaScript is not enabled, instead look for the section "Tags Customers Associate with This Product."

3. Digg this!

4. To send a letter to Gearbox Software, use the contact form on their website.

Sample Letter

Dear Mr. Pitchford,

I'm writing with regards to the use of DRM in your recent release, Borderlands. As you're probably aware, many of your own customers who bought the game in stores were unable to play it for several days due to DRM.

Because of your company's decision to use DRM, and because of the particularly appalling impact it had on users, I've decided to give it a one-star review on Amazon.com, and tag it "defectivebydesign".

• http://www.amazon.com/Borderlands-Pc/dp/B000WQ1XIA
• http://www.amazon.com/Borderlands-Xbox-360/dp/B000WMEEB2/
• http://www.amazon.com/Borderlands-Playstation-3/dp/B000WMEEBM/

Thank you,
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