Tough luck, Rupert Murdoch. The average US consumer loves to read news online, but only 20% of people will pay for it. And if publishers erect a pay wall, more than 80% of readers will simply go elsewhere.

That won’t help the newspaper and magazine industries that have seen ad content plummet. And while online ad revenues in the US are set to overtake traditional media ad revenues, they’re only returning about one-tenth of the value per ad.

A new Pew Internet Project study shows what everybody already knows: Online readers won’t likely pay for mainstream news. That means The New York Times and other newspapers that are going to erect pay walls will suffer more years of anguish. Even a hybrid system where some articles are free and others are subscription or pay-per-view, don’t cut the mustard.

The answers lie somewhere in charging Internet users a fee, like utilities or cellphone companies do, that then gets fractionally disbursed to news providers by telecoms or ISPs. But the power-plays and maths involved are pretty horrible.