alt Hacker NewsI would say that it comes from the military, where projects are given codenames that try hard to be opaque random monikers, and spill no beans about the nature of the project. The Manhattan Project predates mass TV, and most of it did not happen on Manhattan.
I don't mean codenames. I mean literally saying the word "project". It's like meeting a friend and saying "hello my friend I've known for the last 20 years".