Update: 20.12.2009
1. Characters vs. Bytes
2. On Character Strings
3. Yooster
(from: Text Encoding)
Update: 21.12.2009
Busting java.lang.String.intern() Myths
How Hotspot Decides to Clear SoftReferences
Presenting the Permanent Generation
Update: 12.1.2010
Memory usage of Java Strings and string-related objects