here's two e-mails on it...

first written:
Here's the difference between the 2:
 
when using the back ticks, the output gets returned and is not directed to the standard output (the command
prompt)
 
i.e: 
 
$user = `whoami`;
 
The variable $user is set to llam .
 
when using the system(command), the output gets directed and displayed to the standard output (the command 
prompt) and a value of 0 is returned if the command was accepted without any errors
 
i.e:
 
$user = system("whoami");
 
The variable $user is set to 0 BUT llam is displayed on the command prompt.

and another that I sent:
but the "women symbol" is coming out as 0x0C
0000 1101 which is being decoded by your default FONT.
change your dafult font and it prints out other things.
http://www.erg.abdn.ac.uk/users/gorry/eg2069/ascii-table.pdf
in arial it's a bullet.
make sense?