Access special characters Special characters are the symbols you have access to on the Macintosh that weren't available on typewriters, such as upside-down question marks for Spanish (¿), the pound symbol for English money (£), the cents sign (¢), the registration or trademark symbols (® ™), the copyright symbol (©), etc.Below is a short list of special characters you can experiment with. For each character, hold down the modifier key (Option, Shift, etc.) and tap the character key noted. For instance, to type a bullet, hold down the Option key and tap the number 8 on the top of your keyboard (not the number 8 on the keypad). It's no different from typing an asterisk, where you hold down the Shift key and tap the 8. • | bullet | Option 8 | © | copyright | Option G | ™ | trademark | Option 2 | ® | registration | Option R | ¢ | cents | Option $ | | euro | Option Shift 2 | ° | degree | Option Shift 8 | … | ellipsis | Option ; | | en dash | Option Hyphen | | em dash | Option Shift Hyphen | |