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
kruppel_like_factor is a protein	1111	06-jul-2018	95.8
ellison_onizuka is an astronaut	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
milwaukee_county_zoological_gardens is an aquarium	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
poker_poker_tournaments is a board game	1112	24-jul-2018	100.0
alfred_winslow_jones is a monarch	1111	06-jul-2018	96.6
mr_ works for microsoft_corporation001	1111	06-jul-2018	99.2
washington participated in the event series	1113	15-aug-2018	96.9
joseph_conrad wrote the book the_heart_of_darkness	1111	06-jul-2018	96.9
indiana hired hoeppner	1112	24-jul-2018	100.0
george_carlin is a person who died at the age of 71	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0