The dashboard has become the iconic interface through which we understand the coronavirus pandemic. We have dashboards for reported coronavirus infections, hospitalizations, vaccinations, vaccine trials and genetic mapping. These dashboards present information at local, state, national and global levels and are created by government agencies, local and national news organizations, nonprofits, and in some cases, citizen and academic collaboratives. These visual displays are supposed to give us the information we need to act.
Given that the dashboard is one common way for millions of people to engage with and make decisions about the pandemic, we urgently need to understand how these interfaces structure our understanding of the virus — and how they fail to function in some key ways. In fact, covid-19 dashboards are remarkably ill-suited to the complexities of our pandemic reality.
That’s because historically the dashboard has been designed for a reader or viewer who has some power to act.
An 1846 American patent for a sleigh dashboard may well be the earliest use of the term. Affixed to the sleigh, the dashboard provided “more effectual protection from annoyance by the throwing up of snow.” Additionally, Moses Miller (the patent assignee) noted the new dashboard created a more stable and “permanent” fore structure to the vehicle. It became a regular feature of vehicles, such as early cars and trolleys whose dashboards were relatively bare-bones wood or metal and leather barriers that kept debris from being “dashed” up from the ground and onto passengers.
Over the course of car development, that protective barrier, conveniently located at the front of the vehicle, began to house new indicators needed by the driver of the early 1900s. Trolley cable controls and cross-traffic warning lights moved onto the public transport dashboard, and steam, air and fuel gauges moved onto the dashboard and within sight of the driver. With these moves, systems that were housed above, below or behind the driver could be monitored so that the driver could make judgments about driving distance, speed and fluids needs. Similarly, such external factors as oncoming horses or cross-traffic could be signaled to drivers, to enable them to adjust speed and trajectory.
Subsequent innovations brought environmental and entertainment tools within the space of the modern vehicle dashboard as well, allowing drivers and passengers alike to locate themselves in terms of time, space and speed, and — for drivers — to make driving decisions accordingly.