Pros & Cons

Pros

More links = more website visitors = more influence = more conversions = more power.
With creative linkbaiting and targeted promotion, your website can become an "overnight sensation" with a surge in website visitors that dwarfs anything you've experienced before.
As the quantity and quality of links to your website grow, your rank in search engine results will improve, eventually leading to attractive partnership offers from potential allies.
Inbound links are gifts that keep on giving. Once you receive an inbound link from a popular and relevant website, that link will keep pushing internet surfers to you and will keep supporting your higher ranking in search engines, indefinitely.
The rich get richer, in a "virtuous circle": As you earn more links, you'll attract more visitors, who will be inspired to link to your website, which will attract even more new visitors, who will also be inspired to link to your website, and so on.

Requesting inbound links is monotonous and often frustrating. Be prepared for your overtures to be met with rejection and worse: silence. Unless you have the intestinal fortitude of a successful salesperson, it's easy to get discouraged and abandon the effort.
The success of your linkbait campaign relies, in part, on the goodwill and responsiveness of others, which is disconcerting for control freaks and impatient people (me included, on both counts).
Linkbait can be hit-and-miss: Hundreds of content creators are competing for links on high-traffic websites. It's difficult to predict what will be popular versus "so 5 minutes ago." You will be challenged to create content that is funny enough. Or cool enough. Or insightful enough. Or comprehensive enough. Or fresh enough.
Link Building Campaigns are resource intensive. To seek the most important inbound links, it is wise and cost-effective to use in-house staff. But beyond that, cost-effectiveness concerns and will require training and continuously motivating an army of internet volunteers.