Using character entity references or 'plain characters' in utf-8?

(View the source if you don't understand what I'm talking about. Or if I don't understand what I'm talking about.)

Some entity references

• ©: ©
• ®: ®
• ü: ü
• ™: ™
• é: é
• €: €

Plain characters

• ©
• ®
• ü
• ™
• é
• €

I don't see a difference. Neither does Lynx (apart from the weird (?!) ® and ü):