Wildly Waving Arms

To get credit for standing you have to move your Apple Watch arm as if you are walking, so a natural arm swing forward and backwards. Not wildly swinging, just a natural arm swing typically seen while walking.

It takes between 30 and 60 full cycle forward/backwards Apple Watch arm swings within a short period of time (a minute or 2). If you interrupt the arm swinging for a period of time, then you have to start over again to get your 30-60 swings.

If you are carrying something with your Apple Watch arm, it is not swinging. If you are working at the kitchen counter, you are most likely not swinging your Apple Watch arm. If you walk to the kitchen and get 15 arm swings, and then spend 5 minutes preparing breakfast, or holding your cereal bowl with your Apple Watch arm while eating your breakfast over the sink, you are not swinging your Apple Watch arm, and the 30-60 swing count will reset.

There are chefs that are standing all day long in a restaurant kitchen, and they are missing their stands, because most of the time their Apple Watch arm is holding food while it is being chopped, or the Apple Watch arm is carrying something to/from the stove, etc... They at most walk with the arm swinging short distances, before they are again holding something with their Apple Watch arm.

Then again, people that sit and knit, get huge step counts, and never miss their stands every hour, because their Apple Watch arm is constantly moving while knitting.

You will have to wave your arms yes. I cannot really tell a standard, sometimes I walk in my house and I get nothing, and when I drive outside in my power wheelchair which I move by moving 1 finger, it credits me standing time

No, you don't have to "wildly wave your arms", though sometimes it's fun to do that and it does get the blood moving. I find that marching in place with the accompanying arm movements generally does the trick. Or, if I'm at work, walking purposefully with the usual arm swings for a hundred feet or so. Ambling around the house, I don't tend to move my arms that much so, on days I work from home, I try to do some brief exercises every hour. I use a wonderful app called "Wakeout" for this purpose.