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The word “master” still makes sense to me, as it has many different meanings, most of which are appropriate for how they are used in technology.

However I have always felt that the word “slave” (as the counterpart to master) was/is a mistake. It seems to be a relic of the past where people weren’t really thinking through the terminology they chose.

More modern approaches typically use other word pairs, like master/minion, sever/client, active/backup, master/agent, etc. Different pairs are chosen that better describe the relationships, and I suspect those choices were made, at least in some way, to avoid using the term “slave”.




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