title: UTF-8 BOM signature in PHP files
body: <p>I was writing some commented PHP classes and I stumbled upon a problem. My name (for the @author tag) ends up with a <code>ș</code> (which is a UTF-8 character, ...and a strange name, I know).</p>
  
  <p>Even though I save the file as UTF-8, some friends reported that they see that character totally messed up (<code>È™</code>). This problem goes away by adding the BOM signature. But that thing troubles me a bit, since I don't know that much about it, except from what I saw on Wikipedia and on some other similar questions here on SO.</p>
  
  <p>I know that it adds some things at the beginning of the file, and from what I understood it's not that bad, but I'm concerned because the only problematic scenarios I read about involved PHP files. And since I'm writing PHP classes to share them, being 100% compatible is more important than having my name in the comments.</p>
  
  <p>But I'm trying to understand the implications, should I use it without worrying? or are there cases when it might cause damage? When?</p>