Depends on how patient I’m feeling. I usually think about how badly I really need/want whatever the line is for, and choose based on that. But since there isn’t much that I really need, I tend to bail pretty quick.
Waiting behind people who don’t know what they want is a major pet peeve of mine.
there's a whole discipline devoted to this subject, aptly named "queuing
theory."
personally, i always wait because I feel more regret if I later find out the
line accelerated than I do self-satisfaction if I find out the line
barely budged.
Reduce the problem down to: "how much longer should I wait to move up the line one place?" If that time interval follows an exponential distribution, then no amount of time elapsed will help you make that decision.
If you can quantify the time you spend on this activity and the value you get, it seems that the value only decreases over time. (If you count time "left" as your only currency)
Depends what you're waiting for. Personally I'd say about 15-20 minutes is the max for something you can easily get elswhere (like food or many consumer items), 30-40 minutes would be a good maximum for methods of transport wherever there are alternative routes available, and you should only wait indefinitely if you're 100% certain whatever you're waiting for is only available at that location on that day/at that time.
I queued up buy lunch for about 5 seconds until walking away after I'd considered the length of the line and the fact that there's another lunch place I like that's often not as busy 100m away.
I've queued for many hours to catch a delayed plane flight.
Conceivably you could get me to queue for months or a year with a big enough carrot ("for some crazy reason we're giving away pretty nice houses to anyone who queues for them")
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[ 2.6 ms ] story [ 35.2 ms ] threadWaiting behind people who don’t know what they want is a major pet peeve of mine.
personally, i always wait because I feel more regret if I later find out the line accelerated than I do self-satisfaction if I find out the line barely budged.
Reduce the problem down to: "how much longer should I wait to move up the line one place?" If that time interval follows an exponential distribution, then no amount of time elapsed will help you make that decision.
Your future value of waiting does not change with time.
I queued up buy lunch for about 5 seconds until walking away after I'd considered the length of the line and the fact that there's another lunch place I like that's often not as busy 100m away.
I've queued for many hours to catch a delayed plane flight.
Conceivably you could get me to queue for months or a year with a big enough carrot ("for some crazy reason we're giving away pretty nice houses to anyone who queues for them")