For now, the simple ways i which you're using Japanese should work with 'as Unicode text'. I think. I've noticed that it seems to be essential to add that when reading text. I'm a little surprised to see it crop up when setting properties, but probably it's because the encoding is mis-transcribed. Try it anyway, and let us know what happens.
It’s absolutely essential when setting properties. If it’s left out, we just get a blob of text and we have no idea what encoding is being used. So, we assume it’s the encoding that the app’s registered for.
Dan
