Why doesn't jQuery make all functions "live" automatically?

Question

Why doesn't jQuery allow click(), bind() and similar functions to work "live" automatically?

Why do I need to use live("click", functi... if I want to make it work "live", instead of click(function()...? Does live takes more resources?

Answer 1

Funny you should ask that. Someone wrote an entire article answering your question:
http://www.ultimatewebtips.com/why-jquery-live-is-a-bad-option-to-use/

On the surface live and delegate can seem interchangeable. However, they are not. Live has several serious disadvantages and should never be used, and this article will explain why.

The outlined summary is:

1. You can’t use live for reusable widgets
2. stopPropagate() doesn’t work in live
3. Live is slower
4. Live isn’t chainable