The system would be impractical on a personal weapon - it needs a computer system to control it reasonably.
The rounds in the barrel are stacked down the barrel, from the front to the end, and as such, if the rounds are uniform, each one fired will have a different muzzle velocity because of barrel pressure and length issues. A computer could compensate for that in an automated system.
The idea of loading several bullets behind each other in a barrel and then grouping the barrels to achieve a high rate of fire is really not all that new. Actually, it’s about 180 years old…
Patriotic concerns almost force me to link to the following page: http://www.sunewad.dk/espingol_eng.htm - describing how the Dane Andreas Anthon Frederik Schumacher developed a new weapon, the “espingol”:
These weapons were added to the inventory of the Danish Army in the 1820s(!) and saw action in the Slesvig-Holstein revolt 1848-1850 as well as the 1864 war against Germany. Nothing new under the sun…
Yeah, real excellent on paper.
Say that someone high on PCP is breaking into your house and grabs your wife and is seconds from slashing her throat. You grab the nearby trusty firearm to defend her and it doesn’t work because it’s HER gun.
Well, the criminal is safe as her life blood pumps out onto your bedroom floor.
Eutopia has now arrived. Don’t we all feel much better now? :rolleyes:
Alternatively, someone high on PCP breaks into your house, grabs the nearby trusty firearm and puts a bullet through your sleeping cranium, then cuts your wife’s throat anyway, hmmm.
Sorry, it’s probably just me, but I don’t understand the whole gun thing.
Pardon me, cedric45, but what if:
Aliens with ray guns break into your house and you haven’t got a ray gun? What if you have got a ray gun, but it jams?
What if it turns out that the aliens actually feed off the rays from your gun?
Spare us the silly hypotheticals, please. :rolleyes:
Presumably a gun that could be configured to recognise fingerprints could be configured to be fired by either yourself or your wife.
Still not gonna halp when the giant squids arise from the ocean depths, with a different weapon in each tentacle.
Was clearing mine-fields mentioned? It was in the link.
I saw something in there about clearing minefields - it seems to me that this would be rather unworkable.
Youre lucky. You wont need to understand the gun thing `till you live in a country that lets criminals back out on the street who have previously committed crimes with said guns.
antechinus said, “How could you get Canada and Australia confused??”
Easy…they both speak English better than us! 
On A Closely Related Topic–LINKY-LINK!
When these little buggers rise from the sea, with their Atomic Breath, bulletproof Underroos and their Hypodermic Needles, you’ll wish you had a Metalstorm, a ray gun, and Godzilla for a watchdog! And then, my creations and I shall reign over all of feeble Humanity! BWA-HA-HA-HA-HAAAA!
Also, I will blind you with multicolored posts. So there. 
AndrewT, I’m a woman, for starters. I think I made it clear in the OP that I hadn’t read the article closely (which is why I was asking for information). Just because you’re in the “everyone else who speaks English” column doesn’t mean you have to get all snotty about it!
Cedric said, "Yeah, real excellent on paper.
Say that someone high on PCP is breaking into your house and grabs your wife and is seconds from slashing her throat. You grab the nearby trusty firearm to defend her and it doesn’t work because it’s HER gun.
Well, the criminal is safe as her life blood pumps out onto your bedroom floor."
Like THAT’s gonna ever happen!!!
The video showing the drones blowing away the Polynesian guerrillas while sparing the water buffalo is hysterical.
In some sense, the Metal Storm idea is similar to those “arsenal ship” designs being kicked around in the late nineties: equipping one low-profile vessel with 500 cruise missiles and letting it waste an unfriendly nation all by itself. In practice, just arming the ship (or reloading a Metal Storm gun system) turns into a laborious, extremely expensive operation, while a system that fires fewer rounds with better aim prevails.
(hijack)
I see you missed the point of my scenario. Guns, schmuns! It’s not about guns at all. It’s about government trying to make us “safe”. Ignorant legislators do NOT create good technology.
Pardon me if I am sensitive to this but here’s what happened to my family…
The bitch who was running the EPA declared that MBTE had to be added to gasoline because Americans deserved clean air DESPITE chemical industry experts warning of the dangers MBTE posed to humans. The bitch called them un-American, callus oil industry puppets and worse. Well, it got done and now my well water has been contaminated, my little girl suffers health damage and will NEVER be normal due to the effects of MBTE, the well cannot be fixed and even if it COULD I’d have to pay for it and the same bitch is NOW saying the government needs to do something because Americans deserve clean water. The government CAUSED the problem AND the change has had no effect on air pollution!
Now they want guns that “recognize” their owners? Bullshit!
Elected or appointed officials having NO technical experience or expertise making laws that directly affect me and my family’s health and safety? You call that silly? How’s this for silly…
Take these self important civil servants and give them a real job providing a useful good or service. If they do well, fine, leave them there. If they cannot make it in the real world, donate their organs to those who need them so their lives will not have been a total waste. You might include those who think a certain idea is a good idea without thinking it all the way through first.
I am serious about this. {end of rant}
You’ve got this a bit backwards, cedric45.
MetalStorm, a company, has developed a gun which it says is capable of only responding to the proper user.
MetalStorm is trying to sell this gun - particularly to law enforcement agencies. The pitch is that it reduces the risk of an officer’s gun being used against the officer.
There’s no legislative involvement at this point.
Oh. You want something more likely?
Ok.
(more hijack)
Same deal EXCEPT the gun IS a high tech fingerprint safe-as-all-hell-God-himself-couldn’t-use-it-unless-it-was-His type. This technology has made the price of this item jump from around $400.00 to over $10,000.00 and NOW if you ever wanted a gun, (or even cared to learn how to use it) you can’t afford it!
The intruder is now free to cut your wife’s throat, beat you to hell , rape the cat, steal your bible, spill juice on the floor, leave the milk out of the fridge, squeeze the toothpaste tube in the middle, deal drugs to your kids, use all the toilet paper and not replace the roll, erase your hard drive, shave the dog, put his feet up on the furniture, not lift up the toilet seat, not flush, put sugar in your gas tank, double dip chips in the ranch dressing, spread rumors about you at work, let his dog go on your lawn, burn down your house and create any other sort of mad mayhem.
But it’s all ok after all, your government has succeeded in protecting you from gun violence! Feel better now?
BTW, I do NOT own a handgun, nor do I feel I need one. I certainly don’t need officials who don’t even know me trying to “protect” me.
There has already been a law passed (in Mass?) that says whenever this technology is created (not available) any gun NOT having the technology will be illegal for sale in that state.
If this is not legislative involvement then what the hell is?:dubious:
(I’m not a activist for anything but I try to be as informed as I can.)
Cedric said, “This technology has made the price of this item jump from around $400.00 to over $10,000.00 and NOW if you ever wanted a gun, (or even cared to learn how to use it) you can’t afford it!”
You say that like it’s a BAD thing! I’m all for putting handguns into the “luxury” category. Sorry, but if everyone else in the world can get along without them, so can we. (I hate guns, but my husband owns a bunch.)
You’ll need a cite to back that up, cedric45.