You'd think that a reported $25 million round of funding would be great news for Bram Cohen, the creator of BitTorrent. Unfortunately, you'd be wrong, if the whole report is to be believed.

Alongside an official announcement of even more deals with movie and television studios, comes the report, originally from Om Malik at GigaOm that BitTorrent has raised additional funding, and Bram Cohen may be on the way out the door. Michael Arrington at TechCrunch has more information, saying that the total raised will be $25 million from Accel Partners and previous investor Doll Capital Management, and headhunting firm Heidrick & Struggles has been hired to find a replacement for Cohen as soon as possible.

This funding would bring the total to roughly $34 million for the company which came to prominence as the preferred delivery method of pirated movies and software. If you're wondering where the first $9 million went, that's a good question, and it may be the question that leads to Cohen's departure. BitTorrent has been announcing deal after deal with the studios to be a legitimate distributor of digital conent, but still hasn't launched a retail store at its site. The time is nigh, or rather, the time was nigh, for it to make a move in this heavily crowded sector, but it still has not.

It may or may not be too late, but if the rumors are proven true, this money probably had strings attached to it. Someone else will have to steer the ship and fulfill the potential of the deals and the technology sooner rather than later. BitTorrent has some exciting things lined up beyond the deals with the studios. Hardware integration, including router and DVRs, could give it an edge in the all-too-important bridge from the computer to the television. You can't really blame the VC guys if they decide they want someone with a little more experience to push the effort forward. — Brian Ward

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Technorati tags: bittorrent, file sharing, venture capital.