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
auditorium_theatre is a stadium or event venue	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
takin is an animal	1111	06-jul-2018	94.7
gulf_of_maine_aquarium is a zoo	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
n27_20_loss is an event outcome	1111	06-jul-2018	99.9
spuyten_duyvil_railroad_bridge is a bridge	1111	06-jul-2018	98.4
tampa_bay_devil_rays is a sports team that plays the sport baseball	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
andalusia is a city located in the state or province alabama	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
heritage_farms is a farm in the state or province ohio	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
barn_owls is an animal that preys on animals	1114	25-aug-2018	93.8
lieberman is a U.S. politician endorsed by the U.S. politician al_gore	1113	15-aug-2018	99.9