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
blender_hollandaise_sauterne is a condiment	1111	06-jul-2018	99.8
pompano_dolphin is a fish	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
instructing is a physical action	1111	06-jul-2018	90.6
further_computer is an item found on a table	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
radisson_hotel_mt is a hotel	1111	06-jul-2018	97.6
lewisham is a park in the city central_london	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
ambush_bug is related to white	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
n13 is the number of people killed in the event n12_killed_and_many_injured_in_pakistan_blast	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
josh_freeman plays the sport football	1116	12-sep-2018	90.7
caesars_palace_hotel is a tourist attraction in the city las_vegas	1116	12-sep-2018	96.9