Though I welcome the reopening of the bug for Python 3.0 I must say
that plans of not fixing a core element rather surprises me.
I never believed Python to be a programming language with good Unicode
integration. Several points were missing that would've been nice or
even essential to have for good development with Unicode, most ignored
for the sake of maintaining backward compatibility. This though is not
the fault of the Unicode class itself and supporting packages.
Some modules like the one for CSV are lacking full Unicode support.
But nevertheless the basic Python would always give you the
possibility to use Unicode in (at least) a consistent way. For me
raising exceptions does count as basic support like this.
So I still hope to see this solved for the 2.x versions which I read
will be maintained even after the release of 3.0.