Your question is amusing because I can't think of any two things that are more completely opposite to be differentiated between. You were basically asking "Is there any difference between [substance, brushes, the very basic existence that makes a map exist] and [the absence of everything, devoid of substance, nothing]?"
But I'd just like to point out that if you have been liberally using skip in ways it was never intended... that could very easily be the cause of your area portal problems because of broken brushes existing.
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