The LINK token is used in the Chainlink network for activities such as paying for data and putting up collateral. This economic model attempts to create the proper incentives for LINK’s value to rise as more entities come onto the network to provide oracle services.
While this model appears to make sense at first glance, it’s unclear if the additional LINK token is necessary. Much like how Uniswap eventually launched a decentralized exchange network on Ethereum without a native token, a similar situation could occur with Chainlink. There are already other solutions, such as discreet log contracts, which exist in the wild and aim to solve the oracle problem in a different way without the need for something like LINK.