Ask: Is there a "Machine Learning for Dummies"?

Programming Collective Intelligence. It's very well written and you can cover quite a bit of ground without too much arcane theory.

If you want a "less math" machine learning book, I like these two:

Data Mining: Practical Machine Learning Tools and Techniques, Third Edition

Ian H. Witten, Eibe Frank, Mark A. Hall

http://www.amazon.com/Data-Mining-Practical-Techniques-Manag...

Machine Learning: An Algorithmic Perspective

Stephen Marsland

http://www.amazon.com/Machine-Learning-Algorithmic-Perspecti...

PCI is a great, not-too-mathy primer. Let me also add that Drew Conway and Johnny Myles White are working on a ML-type cookbook. Should be available soon via O'Reilly (I think).

To get started, try Mining the Social Web, followed by Programming Collective Intelligence.