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
shell_oil is a pertroleum company	1114	25-aug-2018	100.0
amusingness is a physical characteristic	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
osterville is a geopolitical entity that is an organization	1111	06-jul-2018	94.8
u_t_m is a programming language	1111	06-jul-2018	95.7
south_boston_gazette_virginian is a website	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
llan is a city also known as los_angeles_ca	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
regents_park is a park in the city central_london	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
seth_smith coaches the team colorado_rockies	1116	12-sep-2018	98.4
bed is often found in casita	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
the coach darrell_green won the trophy or tournament super_bowl	1115	03-sep-2018	100.0