As I understand it, this is to some extent a cultural thing: different cultures have different expected latencies of verbal response... that is, different lengths of expected inter-utterance pauses.
I learned to speak in the Northeast United States, in a Hispanic Jewish household: my LVR was negative for most of my life * (that is, the rules I grew up with say it's OK to start talking a little bit before the other person has finished, which has its own set of difficulties), which I imagine is incredibly frustrating for folks who are actually waiting for a pause.
(* -- My LVR increased a fair bit after my stroke but is still pretty low.)
It's not just frustrating; to someone who is not used to such a norm, and who in practice ends up not having a chance to say their part in a group conversation that includes some people who are used to such a norm, those people may well seem rude.
Edit - many apologies to anyone that feels that this discussion was a waste of time.
I just ran across an article (http://techno-anthropology.blogspot.com/2011/04/rough-guide-to-social-skills-for.html) on Hacker News that gives the barest minimum of a guide for social interaction. Unfortunately this isn't the high-quality advice you need to really handle social situations, though it will help with a few of the worst problems.
A few other rules that will help:
On the physical side:
This is a long list, and it isn't even close to complete.
I'm linking to http://lesswrong.com/lw/372/defecting_by_accident_a_flaw_common_to_analytical/ at the suggestion of David Gerard. It has a lot of deeper discussion into why this is worth knowing.