Maybe so, but it’s been something Ive only noticed lately. The same idea has been around since approximately forever, though. It’s not a new thing even in the last few years - things like monitoring dashboards pre-date the WWW.
In fact, dashboards giving feedback about opaque automated systems goes back to early automobiles putting gauges on the dashboard, which previously was just a board to block mud, rocks, etc. from kicking up in horse drawn buggies, presumably when the horse dashed.