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
_18 is a term used by physicists	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
grid_recordings is a record label	1111	06-jul-2018	98.3
italian_market_shopping_center is a shopping mall	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
n14057 is a ZIP code	1112	24-jul-2018	99.6
personal_computing is an item found on a table	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
pat_fitzgerald coaches the team northwestern	1116	12-sep-2018	99.2
dexter_filkins is a journalist that writes for the publication new_york_times	1113	15-aug-2018	100.0
dell_inc is a company in the economic sector of computer	1113	15-aug-2018	100.0
dan is a person who moved to the state minnesota	1112	24-jul-2018	96.9
chicago_south is the home city of the sports team northwestern_university	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0