I feel like things like "auto documentation" and "automated reporting" are code words for "things that superficially sound useful that in reality no human should ever use to make an actual decision". So in that context, well formed commit messages are very important for supporting bureaucratic nonsense. My feeling is that if you want to publish a change log, you should do that by hand while keeping the intended audience in mind, and if you want to review the performance of people, "metrics" are extremely game-able and instead the work should be considered as a whole.