Read the Web
Research Project at Carnegie Mellon University

NELL: Never-Ending Language Learning

Browse the Knowledge Base!

Can computers learn to read? We think so. "Read the Web" is a research project that attempts to create a computer system that learns over time to read the web. Since January 2010, our computer system called NELL (Never-Ending Language Learner) has been running continuously, attempting to perform two tasks each day:

• First, it attempts to "read," or extract facts from text found in hundreds of millions of web pages (e.g., playsInstrument(George_Harrison, guitar)).
• Second, it attempts to improve its reading competence, so that tomorrow it can extract more facts from the web, more accurately.

So far, NELL has accumulated over 50 million candidate beliefs by reading the web, and it is considering these at different levels of confidence. NELL has high confidence in 2,810,379 of these beliefs — these are displayed on this website. It is not perfect, but NELL is learning. You can track NELL's progress below or @cmunell on Twitter, browse and download its knowledge base, read more about our technical approach, or join the discussion group.

Recently-Learned Facts

instance	iteration	date learned	confidence
recombinant_lentivirus is a virus	1111	06-jul-2018	99.0
days_inn_fayetteville is a building	1111	06-jul-2018	94.6
vegetables_and_noodle_soup_recipes is a recipe	1111	06-jul-2018	99.7
canon_georgia is an island	1111	06-jul-2018	96.0
page_inline is an office supply	1111	06-jul-2018	95.2
crustaceans is a type of marine_life	1113	15-aug-2018	100.0
chevrolet makes the automobile corvette	1114	25-aug-2018	100.0
the_united_kingdom is an organization known by the acronym uk_	1116	12-sep-2018	96.9
joseph_conrad wrote the book nostromo	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
alligators is an animal that preys on reptiles	1112	24-jul-2018	99.9