People in a small town with no stoplights or mobile phone service are trying to keep out one of the world's largest technology companies.
在一个没有信号灯也没有移动电话服务的小镇上,人们试图将一家全球最大的科技公司排除在外。
The battle is taking place in the town of Tierra del Mar in American state of Oregon.
这场斗争发生在美国俄勒冈州的蒂拉·德尔玛镇。
Locals there are trying to stop Facebook from developing property in their quiet coastal community. The company wants to build a landing site for an undersea cable connecting the United States with Asia.
The cable will link many U.S. sites with Japan and the Philippines. The connection also will help meet an increasing demand for internet services worldwide, the company says.
Facebook officials say Tierra del Mar is one of the few places on the U.S. West Coast with the right qualities for the high-speed cable.
脸书网官员表示,蒂拉·德尔玛镇是美国西海岸为数不多具备建设高速电缆合适品质的地方。
But locals say underground movements from drilling to bring the cable to this coastal village might damage homes and waste systems. They also note that maps and government records identify Tierra del Mar as a residential area. If state and local officials permit the project, they say, more development will come.
"This is a huge precedent. Once you open the shores to these companies coming anywhere they want to, Oregon's coast is pretty much wide open season," said Patricia Rogers, who lives in Tierra del Mar. She made the comments to county officials in a written statement.
The Tillamook County Board of Commissioners voted in support of the project after considering Rogers' and others' statements on Thursday.
在考虑了罗杰斯以及其他人士的书面报告之后,蒂拉穆克县委员会投票支持了这个项目。
Locals plan to appeal the ruling to Oregon state officials.
当地人计划向俄勒冈州官员上诉这一裁决。
Tierra del Mar is home to a mix of working professionals and retirees. Locals share a love for the town's quiet coastline and for the deer, bald eagles and rare seabirds that call the area home.
The town has only two businesses. It has no mobile phone service. Providers seemingly do not consider it profitable enough to offer service there.
该镇只有两家企业。镇上没有手机网络服务。移动电话供应商似乎认为不值得在这里提供服务。
Locals worry the Facebook project will bring cell phone towers and additional cable sites.
当地人担心脸书网项目将会带来更多的手机信号塔和更多的电缆站。
Facebook representatives told county officials that the drilling project would last about a month. They said they carefully chose the Tierra del Mar site to avoid areas where fishermen use huge nets to catch fish. They also noted they went around federally protected fish habitats.
The company did not offer additional details about the project. But it told The Associated Press in a statement: "With more people using the internet, existing internet infrastructure is struggling to handle all the traffic. These new cable projects help people connect more efficiently."
Internet use worldwide has reached 4.1 billion people, or 54 percent of the world's population. That is up from 1.6 billion people in 2008. Those numbers come from the International Telecommunication Union, a United Nations agency.
Almost all of that messaging and internet use goes through fiber optic cables instead of satellites, said Kristian Nielsen. She is vice president of Submarine Telecoms Forum, a Virginia-based trade magazine.
When data -- including phone calls -- go between North America and other continents, undersea fiber optic cables are used 99 percent of the time, Nielsen said.
尼尔森表示,北美和其它大洲之间99%的数据传递是使用海底光缆,这些数据传递也包括电话在内。
Undersea cables have around 800 landing points around the world, the Submarine Telecoms Forum reports. Opposition to them, Nielsen said, is rare.