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
sofa_mat is an item found on the floor	1111	06-jul-2018	99.3
david_cay_johnston is a journalist	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
seven_viruses is a virus	1111	06-jul-2018	98.3
kbmq is a radio station	1111	06-jul-2018	96.9
warming_scenario is a physical action	1112	24-jul-2018	91.3
r_d__blackmore wrote the book lorna_doone	1113	15-aug-2018	93.8
postal_service is an organization known by the acronym federal_express	1116	12-sep-2018	96.9
system is a subpart of water_line	1111	06-jul-2018	93.8
career_training is an academic program at the university college	1112	24-jul-2018	93.8
el_paso is a city located in the state or province texas	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0