Cleaning you equipment is the most important step in brewing. This goes beyond just making sure there isn't any gunk clinging to the inside of you pot. It must be "sanitized". This simply means that the germs, bacteria, and wild yeast found all around us everyday must be killed off. Not doing this can give your beer and wine some funky flavors.
There are all kinds of products out there promising to sanitize you equipment with the least amount of effort. Yeah whatever. Household bleach is the way to go. Add one or two ounces of bleach per 5 gallons of cold water. Let your equipment soak in this for at least 15-30 minutes. I've heard it should be longer and shorter. I generally aim for 30 and haven�t' had any problems. While you do have this big vat of chlorine water standing around it wouldn't hurt to grab a clean rag and wipe down the counters and stove with some of this solution. What else do you have to do? After the 30 minutes is up rinse the equipment in hot water until all the chlorine smell is gone. Then you are ready. It isn't important to sanitize the pot with bleach water since it will be at a rolling boil for at least 15 minutes. If you don't have a filtration system on you water supply and for some reason you don't trust it (what is that stuff growing around the faucet anyway) it wouldn't hurt to boil the water you will be using either. It's your choice though.
Your bottles and caps need to be sanitized as well before bottling. With a 5-gallon batch of beer this can mean 60 bottles. What a pain. If you are like me though and have a dishwasher with a drying cycle you can sanitize you bottles in there. Just run it through its normal wash and dry without soap (soap residue can kill head retention) or other dishes (how long was that in the fridge?). The heat and steam will kill off nearly everything, just like what is supposed to happen at the hospitals. Let the bottles cool off before bottling, it could kill your friendly yeast so that there will be no carbonation. Caps CAN NOT be run through the dishwasher. The rubber seals just can't take the heat. Break out the bleach.
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