I think this is targeting folks who finish eating a meal and then never leave the restaurant. So a more technical truth would be all you can eat within the reasonable definition of how long one meal lasts.
I mean, that would definitely be against the idea. The whole reasoning behind a concept of all.you can eat is that on average, you make money, but on occasion, you'll lose money. It's like the casino. They don't make money off every single person, as some they'll lose money, but on average, they make more than they lose per person.
I honestly would be ok with someone limiting that. You're taking up table space along with not really following the concept I gave. I don't think anyone thinks a meal reasonably last hours. Two hours would likely be my limit to be honest if I magically inherited an all you can eat buffet restaurant. You'd be representing a very small portion of the target audience and would be a outsized loss on the model. Maybe I could be convinced a little longer, but at a certain point, you're not only representing a loss in margins, but a loss in being able to serve other people. Like, I get the idea that someone wants to "take advantage" but it's not really helping the cause to keep restaurants like this in business. Exploiting everything you can is just not a mindset I can get behind unless it's against a big corporation doing the same to their employees and contractors. Which is usually not the case behind all you can eats. Some are franchises which are debatable, but most are single owned restaurants.
The concept was all you can eat. You're gambling that I eat little enough to make big bucks on it. It's a shit system if there's no possibility for me of winning.
That was not the concept in my comment at all. That just simply ignores the basic tenet as a whole.
Edit: you can still win by just simply eating a lot, but exploiting it by staying for multiple meals is what I consider too far hence my whole comment.