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
donetsk_airport is a transportation port	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
o_keefe_mountain is a mountain	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
low_fat_cream_cheese is a condiment	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
soup_cups is an item found in the kitchen	1111	06-jul-2018	99.6
holiday_clock is an item found on a wall	1111	06-jul-2018	99.5
insects is called ticks	1116	12-sep-2018	99.6
products is a tool used in the profession dealers	1112	24-jul-2018	99.2
wfp is a company headquartered in the city rome	1116	12-sep-2018	96.9
national is a bank that bought fortis	1114	25-aug-2018	100.0
neck_tie is a clothing item to go with shirt	1111	06-jul-2018	93.8