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
president_one is a profession	1111	06-jul-2018	95.9
comment_this_guy is software used by machine-learning scientists	1112	24-jul-2018	99.5
optional_accessories is an item often found in a bathroom	1111	06-jul-2018	99.9
don_larson is an athlete	1111	06-jul-2018	94.7
n1988_ford_mustang is a model of automobile	1111	06-jul-2018	96.0
o_hare_intl is a generalization of temple_of_the_reclining_buddha	1114	25-aug-2018	100.0
bernie_williams coaches the team yankees	1116	12-sep-2018	99.6
bill_parcells is a sports coach also known as barry_switzer	1116	12-sep-2018	93.8
the sports team yankees was the winner of n1958_world_series	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
elephants is an animal that preys on larger_animals	1112	24-jul-2018	93.8