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
ash_breasted_sierra_finch is a bird	1112	24-jul-2018	100.0
n33_21_loss is an event outcome	1111	06-jul-2018	99.9
nick_lyon is a director	1111	06-jul-2018	92.4
westercon is a convention	1111	06-jul-2018	99.9
special_events is a TV show	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
john_wesley has brother charles	1116	12-sep-2018	93.8
football is a sport with fans in the country u_s_	1116	12-sep-2018	96.9
services is a subpart of contact_the_texas	1111	06-jul-2018	93.8
the home stadium of aaron_cook is wrigley_field	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
super_bowl_xliii is a sports game that took place on the date february_1_2009	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0