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
variegated_laughing_thrush is a bird	1112	24-jul-2018	100.0
litchfield_park is a geopolitical entity that is an organization	1111	06-jul-2018	94.7
tracy_smith is a journalist	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
farmers_and_merchants_bank_of_long_beach is a bank	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
gray_leaf_eared_mouse is a vertebrate	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
shower is often found in indoor_bathroom	1111	06-jul-2018	93.8
beds is often found in one_bed_room	1111	06-jul-2018	93.8
wyoming is a state that is bordered by the state oregon	1115	03-sep-2018	93.8
sunshine_coast_airport is an airport in the city brisbane	1116	12-sep-2018	93.8
cleveland_cavaliers is a sports team that plays in the league nba	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0