Hey BIK, what's your malfunction. Suggesting "if you kept your planes further apart.....etc" is way out of line. I invite you (and I'm sure other ATCO's would agree here) to come and watch a radar of a very busy Terminal environment, where there are so many pressures of using minimum separation standards.
I'm sure you would get mighty p*ssed off if somebody told you how to do your job.
(Of course, we don't bother telling P7 how to do his, cause you can't improve on perfection, can you? Oh, and stop reminding people how much I suck............they know!)
I do have a question reference datalink. Let's look at an final approach situation where the a lander suddenly burst a tyre and spills it on the runway. What will happen to the 6 jets following. How will missed approach/breaking off instructions be issued? I'm intested in hearing BIK's thoughts on this one!
Just as an aside as well about technology supposedly making our lives easier, look at thetrial of FAST (Final Approach Spacing Tool) by LHR approach. Playing that things rules was dangerous, and many people showed better landing rates than the machine (apart from me, eh P7?).