You're comparing apples to apples when this is an oranges and apples situation.
Regular campaign advertising (like the stuff done by Clinton in the last election) is at least partly constrained by things like the truth and the semblance of accountability. I.e. if I run an ad saying "vote for me I went to harvard" there would likely be a major scandal because I did not in fact go to harvard. The words came from me, and they were lies.
A 3rd party, dumping thousands of fake news stories on to facebook, disguised as real news and using a little ad spends to pump them up - is not constrained by the truth, and because they are not easily linked to the candidate there is no accountability.
If you're allowed to hide your identity, lie, and disguise your lies as valid information, yes of course you can be more with your ad dollars than if you have to be accountable for what you are saying.
There may be some accountability when it comes to what you say about yourself, but there doesn't seem to be much accountability when it comes to untrue things said about your opponent anymore, though I think it's still traditional to use a third party proxy to say those things:
Regular campaign advertising (like the stuff done by Clinton in the last election) is at least partly constrained by things like the truth and the semblance of accountability. I.e. if I run an ad saying "vote for me I went to harvard" there would likely be a major scandal because I did not in fact go to harvard. The words came from me, and they were lies.
A 3rd party, dumping thousands of fake news stories on to facebook, disguised as real news and using a little ad spends to pump them up - is not constrained by the truth, and because they are not easily linked to the candidate there is no accountability.
If you're allowed to hide your identity, lie, and disguise your lies as valid information, yes of course you can be more with your ad dollars than if you have to be accountable for what you are saying.