Why is utf8 the default in D?

[Steven Schveighoffer]

On Mon, 27 Apr 2009 07:04:06 -0400, Frank Benoit  
<keinfarbton at googlemail.com> wrote:

> M$ and Java have chosen to use utf16 as their default Unicode character
> encoding. I am sure, the decision was not made without good reasoning.
>
> What are their arguments?
> Why does D propagate utf8 as the default?
>
> E.g.
> Exception.msg
> Object.toString()
> new std.stream.File( char[] )
>

I would expect the answer was to be compatible with C, utf8 seamlessly  
implements ASCII.

-Steve