Portkeys Explained

[Alon van Dam]

No: HPFGUIDX 59148

Dear all,

Since this is the first message I'm writing in this group (yay!), I 
don't know if what I'm writing has been written before. however, it 
seems to me that a lot of discussion is going on about portkeys. 
Apparently, the difference between the shoe-portkey of the QWC and 
the cup of the TWC annoys people. 

Now, I will admit to have a (one) problem with the portkeys as well, 
but I'll mention that at the end of this message. First, I'd like to 
go into a short explanation of why I think these different kinds of 
portkeys were employed:

I've seen mention of different types of portkeys, time-activated and 
touch-activated. I'll keep the distinction here. I have never had 
problems with these different portkeys, since it makes sense to me:

1) The Portkey to go to the QWC needed to be in a public place, for 
people living at different places to congregate there, and it would 
be quite heinous if some random muggle pilfered the trash and came 
across the shoe (however unlikely) and would be teleported to the 
QWC, also taking away the transportation option for the WW's: Minor 
crisis. Therefore, a time-option would have been ADDED to the normal 
portkey (which would be touch-activated) to make it so that only 
people touching the object at a certain time would be teleported. 
Since the WW's know the time, it minimizes chances of anything going 
wrong a thousandfold.

2) The one at the TWC couldn't have ben Time-related. It was hard 
enough for Crouch/Moody to make sure that Harry would be the first 
one to touch the Cup (and almost fizzles in that as well): There was 
no way he could possibly have correctly guesstimated the time on the 
dot. Therefore, he needed to make sure that Harry was just the first 
one touching the object, which is what he did.

As you see, both kinds of portkeys have their advantages and 
disadvantages. I believe, however, that the correct one was used for 
every occasion. How hard is it to believe that Wizards who can create 
a portkey can also add a time-function to it: Cause that's what the 
time-portkey is, nothing more.

The problem I have with the portkey is that it would seem stupid to 
make the TWC-Portkey a two-way object. If I'd been Harry or Cedric, I 
would take the TWC along with me while exploring (maybe just too much 
roleplaying on my behalf). A possibility I considered is that all 
portkeys are two-way. However, I seem to remember that at the QWC all 
the used portkeys were just dumped into a large pile, so I don;'t 
know... Maybe time-activated portkeys also have a timed return-time, 
whereas touch-activated also have touch-returns... That, or 
the 'added waypoint'-theorem, or the idea of a safe-catch... Either 
way, it was quite foolish of Crouch/Moody, Peter, and Voldemort ;)

Hope this helps the discussion in some way,

Alon