A new study (pdf) from a telecom consulting firm named Costquest finds that while thirty-nine U.S. States have something vaguely resembling a broadband plan, only ten of the nation's fifty states have undertaken a definitive broadband mapping effort. Keep in mind that several of those states have embraced the "Connected Nation model," whose real benefits remain dubious. Even fewer states have actually reached the point where they've started getting service into unserved areas, according to the report:With the FCC themselves generally agreeing that their own broadband statistics aren't particularly useful, the agency only just started to reform their data collection methodology after a decade of debate (and they still plan on keeping most of the data they get from carriers out of public hands). In other words, with no effective federal or state level penetration mapping, the vast majority of the country has absolutely no idea how wired for broadband it is -- and obviously you can't fix a problem you have no data on.