Credit: Shutterstock | Shutterstock How long would you wait in line for dessert? For food lovers craving this summer’s TikTok-viral dot cakes, the lines in front of Manhattan’s Butterfield Market have been forming as early as 6 a.m. and lasting for hours. This phenomenon is nothing new to NYC, or any other city home to a viral food moment; Broad City poked fun at internet-viral food trends with its fictional “churron” churro-macaron hybrid (remember when Babish actually brought it to life?) and Saturday Night Live parodied the act of waiting in a big dumb line as a painstaking, inevitable human experience. That was before the business of line sitting also blew up on social media. “Line sitting” (or “line waiting” and “line standing”) is exactly what it sounds like: the act of being paid to wait in line for someone else’s Broadway tickets, sample sale access, churron, or table at a popular restaurant. According to full-time, professional NYC line waiter Robert Samuel, there’s been more public interest than ever in the unique job. “It’s always been a thing,” Samuel told Eater by phone shortly after wrapping up a line waiting gig, “but I think social media makes it bigger than it used to be. That’s why there’s more people out there doing it. I blame TikTok more than any other platform.” Samuel was born and raised in Brooklyn, and established his line waiting business Same Ole Line Dudes after clocking the line-spawning demand for coveted products (the iPhone sparked the…
