What's the Deal with Caramel?

[Auburnwine]

Several wines that I have had recently (the Coppola Claret and the Marquis Phillips Shiraz, for example) have had a distinctive caramel flavor. This seems like a new trend. And although I think that it is pleasant, I fear that it will eventually be overdone, as was the buttery toast treatment of chardonnay. Fruit will completely give way to butterscotch.

Is this a function of oaking? Do folks like it?