Coincidentally I noticed this pattern just yesterday here:
http://paulstamatiou.com/android-is-better
and I really like it. The scroll bar isn't enough to tell how much reading is left.
Scrollbars are virtually non-existent on Macs these days. Plus this works well on touch-based devices too. Overall, I like the concept and find it useful as well.
Edit: I'm referring to the reading progress bar concept, not to the loading status referenced in the original post.
Fair enough, and good point on the touch-based devices, I can see how it would be useful for those. I don't use a Mac, so can't comment but same applies.