Thread:The S/@comment-995426-20191023055006

This is at least partially my doing. Up to this point I've been heavily referencing information pages at https://tmnt-ninjaturtles.com/ largely for publication dates and cover images, while relying on the credits pages of the comics themselves. I didn't add that particular reference to the article for City at War, part 7 (IDW), but I think my edits in other articles had the effect of establishing an informal convention for other editors to follow.

While I think tmnt-ninjaturtles.com may not always be the best reference for materials that have not yet been published (because announced information is subject to change anyway), it has always seemed adequate enough for information on materials that have already been published, as by then any mistaken publication dates are fixed, and and the information pages themselves remain readily accessible for years. The site appears to exercise a very high standard of thoroughness, editorial neutrality and overall documentation standards.

Other sites I've checked before, including official ones, have disadvantages when compared to tmnt-ninjaturtles.com: The problem when there's a dearth or official documentation resources, is that often it falls on unlicensed sites (including both Turtlepedia and tmnt-ninjaturtles.com) to try to fill in the gaps. So, yeah, I referenced an unlicensed site, but it anything but a random fansite. 
 * IDW Publishing's comics listings are a catalogue, with the primary function of an online store for selling a product. It provides the most basic information on series, issue, main cover image, page count and primary credits, but no information on alternative covers, and publication dates are only specific to the labeled cover month and not the actual month and day of release.  Furthermore, since it is an online store, I don't have any confidence that any of the catalogue links will necessarily remain accessible from the same URL for years, as commercial websites have the tendency to periodically restructure their online stores as they see fit, because their primary role is to promote and sell rather than to inform.
 * The Mirage Group's aging site has the benefit of remaining online up until now, and a lot of its "back issue bin" information pages have pretty thorough publication information. However, the site only covers materials that Mirage had a hand in producing (the Mirage comic, the Archie comic and the 2003 TV series), and even the back issue bins primary listing page is "under construction" (and appears to have been for a very long time) and currently only has links to information pages for main Mirage comics.  Also, there's no real expectation that these pages will be updated for Viacom-licensed reprints of Mirage material, such as the color classics published by IDW, etc., as Mirage themselves did not have a direct hand in licensing these since the 2009 sale.
 * Viacom does not appear to run one single central website for licensed TMNT, let alone one with referenceable information, and the only primary official website I could find appears to be at Nickelodeon's site and concerning Nickelodeon shows. The official TMNT Twitter is also useless, not only not providing any real documentation or links to documentation sites, but is focused almost entirely on Nickelodeon's shows and audience.
 * TMNTEntity has...enormous baggage. Its blog posts can contain a lot of information, yes, but it's intermixed with the blogger's turbulent editorial rants and his occasional bizarre off-topic self-promotion of extremely questionable taste.