This isn't much different from our outlook on executive orders: People cheered when Obama passed executive orders to get around legislative gridlock, now people are upset about Trump passing executive orders that repeal them or implement his own policies.

People don't generally get upset about power that works in their favor. It takes someone using the power against them before they realize how important it is for that power to have limits.

I don't remember the cheers as Obama used executive orders, quite the opposite.

Depends what party you were listening to, of course. :)

Buying research data from a third-party academic and using it for campaign purposes is not the same thing as a campaign creating an app and then using the available data.

Of course. There are a lot of things that aren't the same. But can we at least all agree that surreptitious, unapproved use of your Facebook data by political campaigns is wrong? Whether they got it from my friends getting an app or my friends (or myself) filling out a survey doesn't change the main issue.

The only real story here is media coverage and subsequent outrage. Otherwise, it doesn't really help the problem and it definitely reeks of side-taking to point out collection strategy differences when the main issue remains.