I've been following you guys for a bit and wonder did you guys really spend over $1m since inception? (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/09/24/tipjoy-raises-1-million...)
We were advised (in retrospect incorrectly) to be ambiguous
and say "raised under $1M" when the amount we raised was
actually much less.
The company hasn’t disclosed the exact amount of the funding, but says that it is just shy of $1 million.
"How much did you raise?"
"It's, um, shy of one million dollars."
Reporter writes "Am't raised: just shy of $1M" in notes.
You should never play for 'perception', after all, everybody that it matters to will have full disclosure anyway and you set yourself up for being called out at some point in the future.
Just say it like it is. I notice that you're still not coming clean about how much you in fact did raise. You're under no obligation to say it but the way it stands right now it could be $100K or it could be $999,999.
If somebody misquotes you that is not your problem, if the press embellishes your story, well, that's what the press does more often than not. But if you purposefully engage in the spreading of false (or suggestive) information then that does not really help.