Drathar, I've watched people who've never cleaned a fish do a not to horrible job their first time (other than forgetting to scale it) with no instruction or guidence. I was one of them- I just skinned the thing.

As for shine, the few times of the year I do fish, I find that anything shiny is effective even when (sorta) live bait isn't. I've caught trout using a "survival" rig made of my walking stick, some spectra braid, a hook, and aluminum foil.

Information is appreciated, but the noise of an attitude can overwhelm what ever useful signal you have. Your attitude in your last post could be easily interpreted as "if you aren't as cool as me, don't even bother".