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It's pretty inefficient. Consider the communications are AM based, line of sight, and a single frequency can't stand two transmissions at once, or the transmission as a whole is garbled. But that's how directives are given and acknowledged between ATC and pilot.

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Those are all features. Line of sight means don't propagate forever. Stepping on somebody else is evident to everybody of a lost transmission.

The only real complaints about radio transmissions are that better training is needed, and there's limited number of conversations per hour possible, sometimes being a limiting factor on landings.

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