> Basically, when you need to read some very old Japanese site where their encoding is pretty non standard, you are screwed.
As it happens, the primary reason why the single menu item remains instead of an override being totally gone is usage in Japan. (Many people in this thread comment as if Firefox had done what Chrome did: complete removal of override as you note.) The remaining menu item is pretty accurate for its primary use case, which is dealing with Japanese legacy sites that misdeclare their encoding. (There is one exception: If the page declares UTF-8 but is actually ISO-2022-JP, then you don't have recourse.)
As it happens, the primary reason why the single menu item remains instead of an override being totally gone is usage in Japan. (Many people in this thread comment as if Firefox had done what Chrome did: complete removal of override as you note.) The remaining menu item is pretty accurate for its primary use case, which is dealing with Japanese legacy sites that misdeclare their encoding. (There is one exception: If the page declares UTF-8 but is actually ISO-2022-JP, then you don't have recourse.)