A friend of mine, who is an editor at Nintendo World Report, once said that perhaps the reason game journalism is so immature is because the journalists aren't really journalists but gamers who got lucky and were picked to talk about games.
I know this for a fact because my friends used to run their own gaming website and freely commented on games through their podcast. If you have the money, the skills and the technology to pull it off you can easily create a game websites without even knowing a lick of journalism or even integrity. You can get away with it too because your fanbase is just as young as you are.
This is why places like IGN and 1up seem to immature. They place their own gaming values over logic and critical thinking. If they don't like a game or system they freely talk about it because they don't know any better and fans accept it that way. Hell, my friends constantly bashed the PSP and PS3 on their podcast, so it goes to show you how immature these sites can be.
Compare this to sites and magazines like PC Gamer and Nintendo Power. They ARE run by journalists, people who work deep within the industry and know how things work, hence why their articles and comments are more articulated and thoughtful.
One way to tell if a site is run by young gamers is by the content. For example, if they use RADICAL and EXTREME attitudes, its run by young gamers. Game Daily and Games Radar are perfect examples of this since half of their content focuses on stereotypical gamer humor and attitudes (like commentary on things like chest hair and boobs).
I have to agree that 1up needs to clean up their act. EGM is closing it doors, and if they go on like this 1up will be next. The Wii, whether you like it or not, is here to stay and has now established new elements into gaming, meaning that we should pay attention because the future might be drastically different from what we imagined. If you decide to keep up the snobbish attitude you'll be looked down as fools who didn't want to accept reality.
