SB replied: Yes, this isn't absolutely settled. 

Michael Penn wrote:  A different one is does the admittedly problematic dating of the plays create a secondary problem in terms of who could've been the author?

SB replied: No. Stylistic analysis of the plays credited to Shakespeare prove - or, if that's too strong a word, strongly indicate - that they are the work of the same person, often working in collaboration with another writer. So the first three parts of Henry VI are written by Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe (the latter now officially credited by The New Oxford Shakespeare), Macbeth contains work by Thomas Middleton,  John Fletcher co-wrote Henry VIII (or "All Is True) and The Two Noble Kinsmen.

As posted before, the role of collaboration compounds the difficulties in arguing that someone other than Will of Stratford was the author, or co-author, of the plays attributed to him in the First Folio.

SB replied: As earlier posted, the role of collaboration is one of the most powerful rebuttals of the argument that someone else other than Shakespeare wrote the plays ascribed to him. Why did Nashe, Middleton, Beaumont, Fletcher etc keep quiet?  Threats? From whom? Or did the Stratford lad somehow fool them all into thinking he was the author?

SB replied: Which "collaborators" from the 1580s and 1590s are you referring to? 

What details are there of any of them having written with De Vere? 

Why did none of them speak out when the work they'd produced with him was falsely credited to Will of Stratford?

Why did none of them leave private written accounts confirming their co-authorship with Shakespeare and complaining that it was being falsely credited to Will of Stratford?

It's odd that Alternative Authorship theorists get excited about exploring the role of collaboration, as it pretty much explodes the basis of their argument that someone other than William Shakespeare of Stratford-Upon-Avon wrote the plays that were credited to him in the First Folio.

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Weren't most, if not all, of them dead by the time The First Folio was published? 

Even before being collected in the First Folio, the plays were being performed by The Lord Chamberlain's Men, then The King's Men, with Shakespeare being recognised as their author. And yet none of De Vere's supposed collaborators - I'm still interested to learn who they were meant to have been - left records like a letter or a diary entry puzzling over why the Stratford man was unfairly reaping the glory.

As post above, and earlier, the role of collaboration in writing the plays is fatal to Alternative Authorship theorists. 

SB replied: Francis Meres attributes twelve plays to William Shakespeare in his Palladis Tamia which was published in 1598. He also separately commends De Vere, making it difficult to believe that the former was a pseudonym also being used by the latter.

In 1607, Sir George Buc, Master Of The Revels, licensed King Lear for publication and attributed it to William Shakespeare.

In 1611, John Davies described Shakespeare as "our English Terence" in his The Scourge Of Folly.

Mark Haslett wrote: Then the great issuance of dramatic works began, until 1600 when the floodgates shut - just as the failed Essex Rebellion put Shakespeare’s work in the context of treason with a performance of Richard ll. After Essex, All the connected performers were executed.

SB replied: No they weren't. Not only were none of the The Lord Chamberlain's Men punished for performing Richard II the day before Essex's Rebellion, but they performed for Elizabeth I the day before his execution. 

As far as I know, there's no record of the play that they performed, but Anthony Burgess suggested that it would have been quite in keeping with Elizabeth's sardonic humour for her to have commanded another performance of Richard II.