AOL CEO Tim Armstrong
AOL CEO, Tim Armstrong was caught in an audio recording firing a Patch employee in front of 1,000 of his co-workers. REUTERS

On August 9, a recording leaked online of AOL (NYSE:AOL) CEO Tim Armstrong firing Patch’s creative director Abel Lenz for taking a photo during a conference call regarding downsizing of Patch's news sites.

The media and business blog of Jim Romenesko, obtained a recording of the firing, which spread virally over the weekend on the social audio distribution platform, Soundcloud.

Armstrong is heard in the recording talking about the future of Patch, the local news platform and website owned by AOL.

“The first one is, I will take full credit and full responsibility for anything that’s not right at Patch,” said Armstrong.

He continued, “I don’t care what the press says, I don’t care if people leak information. I’ve already lived through that at AOL.”

Two minutes into the recording and his speech, Armstrong is heard pausing and addressing someone in the room,

“Abel, put that camera down right now. Abel, You’re Fired.”

After that event, the room remains silent for a period of time before Armstrong continues with his speech.

Listen to the whole speech above and read the full transcript at Jim Romenesko’s website.

AOL owns a network of sites through the Huffington Post Media Group, including Path, Engadget, The Huffington Post, TechCrunch, Moviefone, Mapquest, AOL Music, and more.