Final answer:
The original Ethernet was referred to as 'thicknet' due to the use of thick coaxial cables and was known as 10BASE5. This emerged from early networking efforts by the Department of Defense and universities, later blossoming into the Internet and the World Wide Web.
Step-by-step explanation:
The original Ethernet was called thicknet because the wires used to interconnect computers were heavy coaxial cables. It was also called 10BASE5. Some of the earliest computer networks were developed in the 1960s and 1970s, linking government and academic institutions. Primarily, the Department of Defense researchers in partnership with universities were seminal in this development, which later expanded to form the foundation of the modern Internet. The semi-automatic business research environment (SABRE) introduced by IBM, and concepts such as JCR Licklider's "Intergalactic Computer Network", were pivotal in pioneering these early networks.
As these networks grew, they began to support a wider array of communications, eventually standardized and expanding into the interlinked system known as the Internet. It allowed for unprecedented levels of communication and data sharing, radically changing the technological, governmental, and business landscapes. By the end of the 1980s, hypertext and web technologies had begun to emerge, setting the stage for the World Wide Web we know today.