Gina Christopherson, individually and on behalf of all those similarly situated v. Cinema Entertainment Corporation

United States Court of Appeals
For the Eighth Circuit
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No. 24-3042
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Gina Christopherson, individually and on behalf of all those similarly situated
Plaintiff - Appellant
v.
Cinema Entertainment Corporation
Defendant - Appellee
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Appeal from United States District Court
for the District of Minnesota
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Submitted: May 15, 2025
Filed: December 8, 2025
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Before BENTON, GRASZ, and STRAS, Circuit Judges.
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STRAS, Circuit Judge.
Are movie theaters “engaged in the business” of “rent[ing], [selling], or
deliver[ing] . . . prerecorded video cassette tapes or similar audio visual materials”?
18 U.S.C. § 2710(a)(4). The district court1 concluded the answer was no, which
1 The Honorable Nancy E. Brasel, United States District Judge for the District
of Minnesota.

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meant that Cinema Entertainment Corporation was not liable under the Video
Privacy Protection Act for sharing Gina Christopherson’s personal information. See
id. § 2710(b)(1). We affirm.
I.
Cinema Entertainment screens movies in its theaters across four midwestern
states, including Minnesota. Getting customers in the seats is how it makes money,
both through selling tickets and offering concessions. One way it increases customer
traffic is by offering free movie trailers on its website.
After Christopherson watched some, movie ads started appearing on her
Facebook page. The reason, according to the complaint, is a program called Meta
Pixel, which Cinema Entertainment had installed several years earlier. It allegedly
tracked her activity on the company’s website and shared it with Meta, which then
sent her targeted ads.
Her theory is that, as a “video tape service provider,” Cinema Entertainment
had a statutory obligation not to “knowingly disclose[], to any person, [her]
personally identifiable information.” Id. Once it did, it owed her and other putative
class members “liquidated damages . . . of $2,500” apiece. Id. § 2710(c)(2)(A); see
Fed. R. Civ. P. 23(b)(3). Or so she believed.
Instead of certifying the class and allowing the case to proceed, the district
court dismissed on the ground that Cinema Entertainment was not a “video tape
service provider.” 18 U.S.C. § 2710(b)(1). Missing were plausible allegations that
it was “engaged in the business . . . of rental, sale, or delivery of prerecorded video
cassette tapes or similar audio visual materials.” Id. § 2710(a)(4).

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II.
“We review the grant of a motion to dismiss de novo.” Far E. Aluminium
Works Co. v. Viracon, Inc., 27 F.4th 1361, 1364 (8th Cir. 2022). Like the district
court, we must decide whether Christopherson’s complaint “contain[s] sufficient
factual matter, accepted as true, to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.”
Id. (alteration in original) (citation omitted).
Under the Video Privacy Protection Act, “video tape service provider[s]” owe
consumers a duty not to share “personally identifiable information,” 18 U.S.C.
§ 2710(b)(1), which in this context refers to “specific video materials or services”
they have “requested or obtained,” id. § 2710(a)(3). The violation occurred,
according to Christopherson, when she “requested or obtained” movie tickets and
website trailers, which led to the release of personally identifiable information to
Meta.
The issue is whether screening movies and providing free trailers turns
Cinema Entertainment into a “video tape service provider.” Id. § 2710(a)(4).
Fortunately, the statute tells us who qualifies as one: “any person, engaged in the
business . . . of rental, sale, or delivery of prerecorded video cassette tapes or similar
audio visual materials.”2 Id. It should come as no surprise that Cinema
Entertainment is not in the business of renting, selling, or delivering VHS or
Betamax tapes, which are largely relics of the past. Rather, we must decide whether
it is “engaged in the business” of providing movie screenings or web trailers and
whether either counts as the “rental, sale, or delivery of . . . similar audio visual
materials.” Id.
2 For that reason, we have no reason to hunt for the plain and ordinary meaning
of “service provider.” The statutory definition already gives us everything we need.
See Spire Mo., Inc. v. USIC Locating Servs., Inc., 11 F.4th 908, 911 (8th Cir. 2021)
(observing that a “statutory definition . . . supplant[s]” the plain and ordinary
meaning of a term).

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A.
Cinema Entertainment’s “business” is filling theaters. Id. Revenue comes
from selling tickets, which then gets customers through the door to buy popcorn,
snacks, and other concessions. The movies it shows drive its business, so we must
decide whether putting them on the big screen counts as the “rental, sale, or delivery
of . . . similar audio visual materials.” Id. If it does, then it owes a duty to protect
the personally identifiable information of its customers. See id. § 2710(b)(1).
Running a theater involves the “delivery” of movies to create “audio visual”
experiences. See Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 143 (1986)
(defining “audio visual” as involving “hearing and sight”). And the same movies
shown at theaters were, at the time Congress passed the statute in 1988, later
available on VHS and Betamax video cassettes. Christopherson believes that these
overlapping attributes place theaters squarely within the definition of “video tape
service providers.” In her view, it makes no difference that they never used
prerecorded video cassette tapes to screen movies.
The problem with her theory is what surrounds “audio visual” in the
definition: “similar” and “materials.” 18 U.S.C. § 2710(a)(4). The word “similar”
means “nearly corresponding; resembling in many respects; somewhat alike; having
a general likeness.” United States v. Mitchell, 941 F.2d 690, 691 (8th Cir. 1991)
(citation and brackets omitted); accord Webster’s Third, supra, at 2120 (defining
“similar” as “having characteristics in common: very much alike”). When used in a
catch-all phrase like this one, meant to capture other objects “having a general
likeness” to one or more specific items in a list, Mitchell, 941 F.2d at 691, it triggers
“the interpretive principle known as ejusdem generis,” Designworks Homes, Inc. v.
Columbia House of Brokers Realty, Inc., 9 F.4th 803, 809 (8th Cir. 2021) (emphasis
omitted). Latin for “of the same kind,” it requires us to construe “general words . . .
to embrace only objects similar in nature to those objects enumerated by the
preceding specific words.” Wash. State Dep’t of Soc. & Health Servs. v.
Guardianship Est. of Keffeler, 537 U.S. 371, 384 (2003) (citation omitted). Here,

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we must interpret “audio visual materials” by reference to the item that precedes it,
“prerecorded video cassette tapes.” See Sw. Airlines, Co. v. Saxon, 596 U.S. 450,
458 (2022).
The word “similar” does not stand alone. Immediately after “audio visual” is
the word “materials.” “Materials” like prerecorded video cassette tapes have a
physical existence. Webster’s Third, supra, at 1392 (defining “material” as “of,
relating to, or consisting of matter”). As a basis for comparison, video cassettes have
several attributes owing to their physical existence: they can be touched; played on
a home recorder; watched, rewatched, paused, rewound, and fast forwarded; and
shared with family and friends.
Contrast them with the theater experience. Movies underpin both, but the
similarities end there. Going to a theater provides only a ticket, a license to sit in a
seat to watch a particular movie. The customer has no control from there: the movie
plays from start to finish with no opportunity to pause, rewind, or fast forward. For
a repeat experience, the customer must buy another ticket and come back a second
time, which contrasts sharply with the rewatchability of video cassettes. Perhaps the
closest movie-theater analogy would be the reels or digital files used to screen the
movies, but Cinema Entertainment is not “engaged in the business . . . of rent[ing],
[selling], or deliver[ing]” them. 18 U.S.C. § 2710(a)(4); see Osheske v. Silver
Cinemas Acquisition Co., 132 F.4th 1110, 1113 (9th Cir. 2025) (reaching the same
conclusion because a “theater patron[’]s” experience does not “involv[e] an
exchange of video materials” for money (emphasis added)). Movie theaters may
“deliver[]” movies, but not the “materials” necessary to watch them. 18 U.S.C.
§ 2710(a)(4) (emphasis added); see Osheske, 132 F.4th at 1113.
If Congress had something else in mind, it could have said so. See Rosewell
v. LaSalle Nat’l Bank, 450 U.S. 503, 523–24 (1981) (noting that “one would expect
to find some mention of” an “expansive” category that “Congress knew” about at
the time of enactment). When it passed the statute, the United States had more than
20,000 movie theaters in cities and towns across the country. It would have been

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easy to add movie theaters. See, e.g., 17 U.S.C. § 101 (defining a “motion picture
exhibition facility” as “a movie theater, screening room, or other venue that is being
used primarily for the exhibition of a copyrighted motion picture”). The fact that it
did not suggests that “rent[ing], [selling], or deliver[ing] . . . similar audio visual
materials”3 is not what movie theaters do. See Kucana v. Holder, 558 U.S. 233, 247
(2010); see also T-Mobile S. LLC v. City of Roswell, 574 U.S. 293, 307 (2016)
(“Congress could adopt such a rule if it were so inclined, but it did not do so in this
statute. It is not our place to legislate another approach.”).
B.
The online movie trailers present a different problem for Christopherson.
Even if we were to assume making them available on its website counts as the
“delivery of . . . similar audio visual materials,” Cinema Entertainment must be
“engaged in the business” of providing them. 18 U.S.C. § 2710(a)(4). Only then
would it potentially be liable under the Video Privacy Protection Act for sharing the
information it collected about Christopherson.
Here, Congress provided definitions for several words and phrases, but
“engaged in the business of” is not one of them. “In the absence of a statutory
definition . . . , statutory terms are given their plain, ordinary, and commonly
understood meaning,” usually by “turn[ing] to a commonly used dictionary.”
Schumacher v. Cargill Meat Sols. Corp., 515 F.3d 867, 871 (8th Cir. 2008). The
word “engage” means “to begin and carry on an enterprise, esp[ecially] a business
or profession.” Webster’s Third, supra, at 751. A “business,” the other key word,
3 It means little that courts have sometimes given an expansive meaning to
phrases like “audio visual materials” in other statutes. See, e.g., Sony Corp. of Am.
v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U.S. 417, 449 (1984) (mentioning “motion
pictures and other audiovisual works” in the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 102 (a));
McGann v. Cinemark USA, Inc., 873 F.3d 218, 223 (3d Cir. 2017) (considering
“visually delivered materials” in the Americans with Disabilities Act, 42 U.S.C.
§ 12103(1)(B)). Unlike this one, none of those require “similar[ity]” with
“prerecorded video cassette tapes.” 18 U.S.C. § 2710(a)(4).

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refers to “transactions, dealings, or intercourse.” Id. at 302. Together, “to be
engaged ‘in the business’ of something generally means to be regularly engaged in
it for livelihood or gain.” Fox v. Amazon.com, Inc., 930 F.3d 415, 422 (6th Cir.
2019) (quoting Black’s Law Dictionary (4th ed. 1968)). Courts have recognized that
a company can be engaged in multiple businesses at the same time. See Salazar v.
Nat’l Basketball Ass’n, 118 F.4th 533, 548 (2d Cir. 2024); see also Snyder v.
Comm’r, 295 U.S. 134, 138 (1935) (explaining that, for tax purposes, a person “may
be engaged in more than one trade or business”).
For Cinema Entertainment, its business is selling movie tickets and
concessions. If it is “engaged” in more than one business, movie exhibition and food
service are the two it does for “livelihood or gain.” Fox, 930 F.3d at 422. A web
trailer, on the other hand, is a type of advertisement, a way to get potential customers
in the seats by generating interest and anticipation for a film. By itself, however, it
does not involve a “transaction[], dealing[], or intercourse,” Webster’s Third, supra,
at 302, nor does the company provide them for “livelihood or gain,” Fox, 930 F.3d
at 422.
Consider the role advertisements play in other well-known industries.
McDonald’s, among the most iconic of American companies, spends millions a year
on print, television, radio, and online advertising. But if one were to ask what
“business” it is “engaged in,” see Salazar, 118 F.4th at 548, any response would
likely focus on selling hamburgers and other fast food. No one would say it is
“engaged in the business of” advertising or making commercials. See In re Vizio,
Inc., Consumer Privacy Litig., 238 F. Supp. 3d 1204, 1221 (C.D. Cal. 2017)
(explaining that letter carriers physically “deliver” videotapes to consumers, but no
one would mistake them for “video tape service providers”); see also Bartenwerfer
v. Buckley, 598 U.S. 69, 75 (2023) (equating “plain and ordinary meaning” with
what “an ordinary English speaker would understand [a] sentence to mean”).
The same is true of movie theaters. “[A]n ordinary English speaker,” id.,
would say they are “engaged in the business” of selling tickets, screening movies,

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and perhaps offering concessions like popcorn and candy, not posting free movie
trailers on their websites, 18 U.S.C. § 2710(a)(4). If they were, any business that
posts video-based advertisements on its website, including McDonald’s, could
qualify as a “video tape service provider” based on the “delivery of . . . similar audio
visual materials.” Id. No one, not even Christopherson, thinks the Video Privacy
Protection Act stretches so far.4 See Whitman v. Am. Trucking Ass’ns, 531 U.S. 457,
468 (2001) (“Congress, we have held, does not alter the fundamental details of a
regulatory scheme in vague terms or ancillary provisions—it does not, one might
say, hide elephants in mouseholes.”).
III.
We accordingly affirm the judgment of the district court.
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4 Christopherson asks us to construe it “broadly” in favor of liability because
it is “remedial in nature.” Townsend v. Bayer Corp., 774 F.3d 446, 459 (8th Cir.
2014). Even if it is, “our analysis need go no further” than “the plain language” of
an “unambiguous” statute. Id. (citation omitted). We will not “stretch” the text to
support an interpretation “well beyond what [it] can naturally bear,” remedial or not.
Fla. Dep’t of Revenue v. Piccadilly Cafeterias, Inc., 554 U.S. 33, 51 (2008).

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