After the post on Second Life and virtual reality contact centers, my expectation was there’d likely be relevant industry news, but not anytime soon. Wrong. In an article in the New York Times, a Cambridge-based company now lets users navigate through 3D cityscapes of New York and Boston, rendered with special video cameras. More interesting: you can walk through the interiors of selected stores. It’s called blended reality, combining virtual reality and video representation of real-world scenes. Interactivity is not available yet, but it’s clearly the next step. Could the following scenario become reality next year (or next month)? Customer views video of his favorite book store from his home computer or iPhone. He navigates to cooking aisle, clicks on a book, peeks inside, and then clicks again for help. A window then pops up with a real-time video connection to a salesperson.