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
heatproof_mixing_bowl is an item found in the kitchen	1111	06-jul-2018	99.4
cranberry_fruitworm is an insect	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
n4_15 is a performance metric used by machine-learning scientists	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
phi_mu_epsilon is a professional organization	1111	06-jul-2018	92.8
_110_000 is an award, championship, or tournament trophy	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
oracle has acquired hyperion	1114	25-aug-2018	100.0
commercial_appeal is a newspaper in the city memphis	1116	12-sep-2018	93.8
guillermo_mota is an athlete that flied out to position center	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
spiders is called recluse	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
michigan_state_university is an organization known by the acronym msu	1113	15-aug-2018	100.0