抓取reddit评论并使用php将它们存档在数据库中

so I know basic PHP, I coded a basic mysql/php inventory system awhile ago. I want to get more experience. My idea is to grab reddit comments, display them on a page, and then save them in a database. My problem is I don't know how to grab and make sense of JSON data.

For example, here is a JSON link to a reddit thread: http://www.reddit.com/r/blog/comments/117ckb/introducing_three_new_hires/.json

Goal:

INPUT BOX -> reddit unique thread id in input box (http://www.reddit.com/r/blog/comments/<6 digit unique ID>) -> loads reddit comments on the page

That's my current goal, would really appreciate a nudge in the right direction with processing JSON. I know I COULD just Google it, but I'm posting in hopes of someone having experience with the above and offering their expertise on the topic.

Here's a starting point:

$download=json_decode(file_get_contents('http://www.reddit.com/r/blog/comments/117ckb/introducing_three_new_hires/.json'));

    foreach ($download as $articles){

         foreach ($articles->data->children as $article){

                 print_r($article);
                   }
             }

Please note: I recommend using Curl instead of get_file_contents() - it's a lot faster!