What about Italy?

Bad form to not pause for extenuating circumstances...
but also bad form to expect others to save you when you over-committed. Besides... we have seen many instances where it becomes hard to impossible to unpause a game.

Pausing for the death or serious illness of an immediate family member = civilized and compassionate. Pausing for going out of town = eh... optional. Seems to me that other arrangements could be made such as someone moving for you... or logging on at your local Kinko's, library, friend's house, or hotel. That game was in the starting moments... it's not like you failed an ally in a critical move... or invested a huge amount of time in the game already.

What is needed is the capacity to put in a set of orders for the next turn, as this would solve of this problem. So far I think only one website has written code for that.

Or you get a sitter... and even give him the moves you want.

I disagree. I think anything that encourages players to make decisions in advance will hamper diplomacy. Even if players do still make the orders at a sensible time, others will be less sure if they'll get a response to their communications, and well etc etc. Also, how would you decide when someone goes CD? A new player joining could use that to set up more orders and thus not go CD despite having no intention of returning after his first day (happens a lot).
Basically I think that as well as being hard to code, this would actually be detrimental to the site.

The judges allow for advanced orders should one know they are going out of town or need to go away. Of course, they also provide a provision to declare an absence and the GM can put it on hold.

So you joined a game knowing you'd be unable to make moves in the first turn without a pause? Why did you even join that game? If you'd waited until you got back none of this would be a problem - I know I'd be pissed off if a game started and a player asked for a pause almost immediately, especially if it was something he'd have known about before the game started.

I joined a game and then immediately discovered that we were going camping. Camping. Away from civilization. I didn't have any time, it was a surprise, and it was a mistake, yes, but it would've been nice and quite frankly polite if I had gotten a pause, and now I've probably missed another phase. Oh well, that game seems to be over for me.

Your problem, not their's. You "discovered" you were going camping? Well it seems someone should stay in touch with the people who run their lives. And if you say they don't then you should have been able to NOT go camping. It isn't the other players fault that you don't control your own life well enough to know when the people who do have a vacation planned for you.

Oh, and some of us have Verizon Aircards and auto power converters for our laptops. I can play virtually anywhere.

c'mon Draugnar, surely you can't be having a go at someone who has been roped into going camping...

oh sorry, you never go camping away from WiFi, I forgot.

Whenever I leave town, I pay the neighbor to watch over it. He plays Diplomacy too, and I tell him who my allies are. It solves the problem. I hope to get an Internet-enabled phone next year (when my contract expires)

WiFi, schmifi. I have the Verizon network for my laptop. And, yeah I can. If he was serious about his obligation to play diplomacy, he'd tell his friends he wasn't going. If he is so young he can't get out of it because of his parents and they are the type to up and go camping without warning, then he shouldn't be making commitments elsewhere. It's that simple.

Geez. Forget WiFi. You went camping, you missed your moves. Yes, it would have been nice if they paused, but they didn't. Get over it. Don't expect other people's lives to stop because you left town. Take some responsibility for yourself, APOLOGIZE to your game for missing your moves (Yes, apologize - you made a commitment to play and failed to follow through) and get on with your life.

If I were going camping, no, i wouldn't have brought WiFi, though I have the capability. I would have looked for a sub or tried to get a sub, and failing that, I would have accepted the fact that life goes on without me, and enjoyed my camping trip.

'looked for a sub or tried to get a pause'

DJ +1