To keep the non-technophiles occupied while they wait for their external device to be detected, and to soothe them by giving them something to do (repeatedly) to "speed up" their ageing computer.
You are getting a lot of down votes, but the truth is that this behavior is very common in some cultures, and not all of HN may have seen it before.
When I get impatient I just swirl the mouse in a small counter-clockwise circle, but I have seen others do the rapid right click, refresh sequence. It was mostly Asian computer users[0], and some of them had practiced it enough that they would do this 3-4 times per second while waiting for the computer to react.
[0] I first noticed this in Iraq, but the Chinese students at school do the same thing.
When I get impatient I just swirl the mouse in a small counter-clockwise circle, but I have seen others do the rapid right click, refresh sequence. It was mostly Asian computer users[0], and some of them had practiced it enough that they would do this 3-4 times per second while waiting for the computer to react.
[0] I first noticed this in Iraq, but the Chinese students at school do the same thing.