I've been trying to fill in image sources for some past uploads (mostly over a few years old), but in some situations I'm not sure what's the best kind of source to use.
I've considered the help:image source wiki page, particularly this part on non-internet sources:
Non-internet sources
Note that providing a URL for your uploads should be preferred over all else, especially if it did not come from yourself. However, for uploads from a non-internet source (self scan, fandisc, screencap, game rip, etc.), specify what material the image came from: the work title or the episode name, for example.
1. Suppose we have a scan of an artbook page, and it's an md5 match with a third-party post (not posted by the artist) like yande.re. Example: post #590525. What kind of source is preferred? A yande.re URL, or source text with [Circle (Author)] Title
of the artbook? Note that the yande.re post might be part of a pool which identifies the book clearly, or the yande.re post's source field might be filled in - would that affect the answer?
2. Suppose there's an image where someone added a third-party URL source many years ago, but now it's a broken link. In the absence of an alternate URL, is it better to replace that source URL with a text source such as [Circle (Author)] Title
? At the moment I'm mainly thinking of moeren and Dropbox sources (source:http://moepic, and source:http://dl.dropbox plus the https variant).
3. Suppose we have a scan of a dakimakura, stick poster, etc. and there's no known md5 match anywhere. Often, it may be impossible to find a word-for-word official name for this kind of product. In this case, which source type is preferred: an informational URL (like a product page or blog post) which identifies the product well, or a text source describing the product (including brand/vendor, release date/event, etc.)? Are informational URLs acceptable as sources, or should such URLs go in comments only - say, due to non-web source tag gardening concerns? Take post #1475845 for example.
Apologies if I missed some obvious answers. I searched around the forum somewhat, but didn't quite find what I was looking for.
Updated