I think more to the point, blame Joel Spolsky:
<a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.joelonsoftware.com&#x2F;articles&#x2F;Unicode.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.joelonsoftware.com&#x2F;articles&#x2F;Unicode.html</a><p>He made it easier to understand unicode!