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
chevy_truck_c3100 is a kind of vehicle	1111	06-jul-2018	99.6
gloria_mactaggart is an author in the scientific field of machine learning	1111	06-jul-2018	96.3
the_charlie_rose_show is a TV show	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
brass___chrome_silver is a building material	1111	06-jul-2018	97.7
internet_becoming is a physical action	1111	06-jul-2018	93.0
sangre_de_cristo is a mountain in the state or province new_mexico	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
mike_matheny plays the sport baseball	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
toronto_pearson is an airport in the city toronto	1116	12-sep-2018	99.5
ollantaytambo is a city that lies on the river urubamba	1112	24-jul-2018	96.9
george_w is a U.S. politician who is a member of the political group house	1114	25-aug-2018	100.0