title: Convert JSON string of unicode characters to dict Python 3
body: <p>I am trying to count the number of Unicode characters in the JSON data. I am using requests to get the data from the feed.</p>
  
  <pre><code>import requests
  
  r = requests.get('https://venmo.com/api/v5/public?since=1438578858&amp;until=1438578958')'
  j_data = r.text
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Now, I need to convert the <code>j_data</code> into a dictionary to get the <code>message</code> items alone. If I just use <code>json.loads(j_data)</code>, I get <code>UnicodeEncodeError: 'charmap' codec can't encode character</code>.</p>
  
  <p>Therefore, I am encoding the <code>j_data</code> and then trying to convert to dict using <code>loads</code>. I am getting this error</p>
  
  <pre><code>TypeError: the JSON object must be str, not 'bytes'
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>How to approach this problem?</p>
  
  <p>Code:</p>
  
  <pre><code>import requests
  import json
  
  r = requests.get('https://venmo.com/api/v5/public?since=1438578858&amp;until=1438578958')
  
  j_data = r.text
  
  encoded = j_data.encode()
  
  b = json.loads(encoded)
  print(b)
  </code></pre>