What does it matter? Google updates links and PR all the time, they just don't make the figures public.
... I don't know that it is actually. The last PR export happened in early Jan (about 6th Jan it began if memory serves) - if you look at these pages in TechCrunch: page 1 and page 2: you'll notice that the first page, only a week before the PR export, managed to obtain PR whereas the second page didn't. Ergo, the cut-off for the last PR export was about 1 week before the export date of 6 Jan. Following the same logic the cut-off for the next PR export, expected in mid to late April, is likely to be about one week earlier. This would mean any backlinks generated up until the beginning of April have a fair chance of being counted.
IMO--PR update has already begun-- I had a PR6 links few weeks back--today I checked again and it is PR5 So --if you are building free links--they are always useful--but I won't advice for short-term links buying--maybe you can lawyas go for permanent links. best of luck.
Maybe the links that you gain is few and not quality links. Well if you build more links from december up to next update of google expect to get backlinks update.
It does seem like the BL and PR updates are slowly beginning now, so any links gained from now on would probably only affect the PR in the update coming in approx. 3 months. With that said I think you should just go ahead with your backlink campaign and don't worry too much about PR unless your sole goal is to sell textlinks.
Everyone keeps on saying this but I think you're being over-optimistic. It's not likely there'll be a PR export until mid-late April. It's possible there's a slight rollback now, but I've not seen any evidence of that yet either and I've been keeping a keen eye on the DCs.
I dont think it is too late, if it is for your site, you may not gain any rank from the next update. But if you are doing it for someone and you want to get result in the next update, I consider it to be too late.
No smoke without a fire Well, you could be right that this is just a pre-export roll-back, but no matter what, the export is most likely just around the corner and the backlinks could be frozen by now, so I'd definitely say the chance (or risk if you like) of any backlinks appearing from now on not being counted is pretty high.
If they count for this PR update then great. If not then they will count for the next one so all is good in my book.