If we see it almost exactly from the top, then why is one half of the ring so much brighter than the other?
"Third, adopting an inclination of 17° between the approaching jet and the line of sight (Walker et al. 2018), the west orientation of the jet, and a corotating disk model, matter in the bottom part of the image is moving toward the observer (clockwise rotation as seen from Earth). "
On the other hand, "almost exactly from the top" is not the same as "exactly from the top".