Why UTF-8/16 character encodings?

[monarch_dodra]

On Wednesday, 29 May 2013 at 01:29:07 UTC, Diggory wrote:
> On Tuesday, 28 May 2013 at 23:33:47 UTC, Peter Williams wrote:
>> On 28/05/13 19:12, Jacob Carlborg wrote:
>>> On 2013-05-28 08:00, Manu wrote:
>>>
>>>> Is there anywhere other than America that doesn't?
>>>
>>> Canada, Jamaica, other countries in that region?
>>>
>>
>> Last time I looked Canada was in America (which is a continent 
>> not a country). :-)
>>
>> Peter
>
> America isn't a continent, North America is a continent, and 
> Canada is in North America :P

Well, that point of view really depends from which continent 
you're from:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continents#Number_of_continents

There is no internationally agreed on scheme. I for one, have 
always been taught that there is only "America", and that the 
terms "North America" and "South America" where only meant to 
denote regions within said continent.