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
n3_243 is a term used by physicists	1111	06-jul-2018	91.3
wide_layer is a sports team position	1111	06-jul-2018	98.6
erector_spinal_muscle is a muscle	1111	06-jul-2018	99.5
velveeta_shells_and_cheese is a cheese	1111	06-jul-2018	92.3
winter_hiking is a hobby	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
blue_jays is an organization also known as xml_feed_tweet_seattle_mariners	1113	15-aug-2018	93.8
kmbc is a TV station in the city kansas_city	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
air_canada_center is a tourist attraction in the city toronto	1116	12-sep-2018	99.0
dsc_communications terminated the employment of john_hendricks	1113	15-aug-2018	100.0
kmuw is a radio station in the city wichita	1116	12-sep-2018	96.9