Any particular reason why you'd rather not use IFTTT? It's one of the easiest solutions out there, and implemented with about 1 line of code.
If that means every time the Photon starts up, then that's also possible via IFTTT, since the cloud will emit a 'online' SSE on connection, which can be picked up by IFTTT like demonstrated over here.
Assuming you've got valid reasons for not using IFTTT, there's this topic. Although Webhooks is perhaps the better alternative to that now.