I'm probably missing something simple, but I can't seem to find what changed in recent versions of popular Node modules. Express, Connect, Stylus, etc...
I realize it is up to the maintainers to write changelogs, and not everyone does. I look through the commits, but that doesn't usually help too much as I'm not super familiar with what a given line of code is for unless it's obvious. It's super handy if there's a list (usually short) of what the changes mean to me as a consumer of the code in (relativly) plain language. Something like this: http://aws.amazon.com/releasenotes/2817276026948755
Am I missing something, or do most modules just not get these (presumably because people are busy and I should fine the time to delve into the source)?
A lot of module authors don't include any changelog or history unfortunately. Fortunately for you though, some of the most popular ones do.
Uncoincidentally, all of the ones that you posted are by TJ Holowaychuk who does a good job of updating a Changelog in a file he names History.md.
Look for a file named something like history.md or changelog.md otherwise you're stuck with commit logs. I hope this helps some.