Why would you punish people for not posting for a week just to let people eager to join your game in? Why not just let those people in? Because for you to so easily remove someone from your game is almost the equivalent of spitting on their work. Like, their writing didn't mean anything to you for you to keep them around. Almost like you don't enjoy anyone's presence and that all RP is is a business rather than something fun to do.

I honestly don't see why someone would go inactive for an entire week without first giving you a reason why such as their computer breaking, focusing on exams (exam crunch), moving state, who knows? It just seems cut-throat. Why not just skip the person if they take too long, find out where they are or what's going on, and if you don't hear anything back from them after two weeks, then just drop them from the game. One week just seems crazy. Like seriously, what's your hurry? How are you being affected by that one person not being active? It'd be easier to just let people in, shed off all the inactives (as they appear), and that way you won't be losing people for no reason.

You said this was your first GM game right? Let me tell you something. Games will be created and games will die regardless of what you do. You can only do so much as a GM. You can't make a game and be like, "I know this game will last forever." Because it won't. No game does. I've ran a game that lasted literally 10 years (started it in middle school and it lasted into college) and it died and we were only halfway through the storyline. My most recent game was coincidentally a DBZ game on another site and that died after 2 years. But DBZ themed games [i]usually[/i] live a long time. Usually.

Your goal should be to enjoy the game while it lasts. I know some of the games on this site die as soon as they are created. Some people rush into the game, don't fit in, bite off more than they can chew, and then the game dies for those reasons. The only thing that you can do to prolong the game's longevity is to filter out those who don't seem dedicated and KEEP those who ARE dedicated. You'll know them when you got them because they will contribute so much to the game. They love their characters, they interact comfortably with others, and basically everyone has a good time. 

You won't be able to get that just by kicking people out for the hell of it. Not everyone was born to sit at the computer for the rest of their lives. You got people with jobs, soldiers, federal employees, nurses, you got all types of people on this site. The only ones that should matter are the ones that LOVE your game. You want to keep those people.[@NacNak]