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
buffalo_campground is a place to ski	1111	06-jul-2018	92.5
adam_bostick is an athlete	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
grain_hot_cereals is a grain	1111	06-jul-2018	96.2
n12096 is a ZIP code	1112	24-jul-2018	99.8
pace_university_setters is a sports team	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
aflac is a company in the economic sector of insurance	1114	25-aug-2018	100.0
okmok is a mountain in the state or province alaska	1116	12-sep-2018	93.8
kurt_westergaard belongs to the ethnic group danish	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
white_river_amphitheatre is a stadium or event venue located in the city auburn	1116	12-sep-2018	93.8
carl_bernstein is a journalist that writes for the publication washington	1113	15-aug-2018	99.6