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
shot_glasse is an item found in the kitchen	1111	06-jul-2018	99.6
jack_bond is a male	1111	06-jul-2018	90.6
instructing is a physical action	1111	06-jul-2018	90.6
ub_post is a publication	1111	06-jul-2018	95.6
representative_dutch_ruppersberger is a politician	1111	06-jul-2018	91.4
stephen_mandel is the leader of the city edmonton	1116	12-sep-2018	98.4
ricky_jean_francois is an athlete who injured his/her hand	1115	03-sep-2018	96.9
dunedin is a city that lies on the river taieri	1112	24-jul-2018	93.8
orlando is a city located in the geopolitical location national	1114	25-aug-2018	93.8
english is the language of the country u_s_	1116	12-sep-2018	93.8