STLQ

:: From a post on CHMINF-L this morning, Dana Roth reports the following:

http://www.freepatentsonline.com

This web site has free PDF downloading (instead of having to page through TIFFs like at the US Patent Office). On the initial text display page, click on 'View Patent Images' and then click on 'View as PDF [1.3M]', to get a PDF of the full patent ...

Having the .pdf of the full patent is a bonus. As Dana notes, not having to page through the .tiff files on the USPTO site would save much research time, and also allows for saving the .pdf file to your computer. There is an Expert Search function that uses the same search syntax as the USPTO.

Patents are available from #4,000,000 forward. There is no explanation or reason given on the site as to how they are able to offer access for free.