Certainly YMMV greatly on these things. Speaking for myself, if someone simply looks up public information on the net about someone else they are interested in

Certainly YMMV greatly on these things. Speaking for myself, if someone simply looks up public information on the net about someone else they are interested in, that's pretty normal and anyone who claims to have never done it is likely full of shit (or very old). The creepiness comes in depending upon how they use that information. If they use it to lie and suggest their interests are aligned in ways they aren't or in other deceptive ways then yeah that's creepy but in a way that is actually independent of the so-called "e-stalking". It would still be creepy if they learned the information they used from a friend or whatever other old-school method. If, on the other hand, the person sees on Facebook that you're a huge fan of some hobby and they too are actually a huge fan of some hobby and they mention that, I don't see that as being creepy at all, but again YMMV.