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
dwarf_slit_faced_bat is a mammal	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
vibrating_alarm_clock is an item found on a wall	1111	06-jul-2018	99.5
quanzhou_dialect is a language	1111	06-jul-2018	98.9
tim_marx is a North American person	1111	06-jul-2018	91.3
n6_7_00 is a time	1112	24-jul-2018	100.0
states is a state or province located in the geopolitical location southern_company	1114	25-aug-2018	100.0
jordan_danks is an athlete who injured his/her hands	1113	15-aug-2018	100.0
bon_secours is a hospital in the city richmond	1116	12-sep-2018	93.8
the coach scott_baker won the trophy or tournament world_series	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
robin died in the location new_south_wales	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0